SECOND HALF 16TH CENTURY

Mary Harriman Rumsey, the daughter of the New York financier and railroad baron Edward Henry Harriman was spirited, independent and progressively-minded. In 1901, as a 19-year-old debutante, she founded the Junior League, a women's philanthropic society that promoted urban social welfare, and in the 1930s she became a leading proponent of Roosevelt's New Deal. Mary's younger brother, William Averell Harriman, became a distinguished statesman under Presidents Roosevelt and Truman, a one-term governor of New York, and twice sought the Democratic Party nomination for president. Both Mary and Averell were notable art collectors.