Born: September 15, 1868
Died: March 11, 1936
Married: Eleanor G. Bosher
Children: Benjamin Brewster, Edward C. Brewster, Frances Brewster (d. July 16, 1982), Katharine Brewster
George S. Brewster, of New York and Oyster Bay, was one of the largest shareholders of Standard Oil. He came to Saranac Lake in 1904 to recover from tuberculosis. He subsequently built Camp Longwood on Spitfire Lake, hiring architect Robert F. Stephenson in 1906-08 who designed a typical Adirondack “Great Camp” with separate buildings sited to blend into the woods. He served on the board of the Adirondack Cottage Sanitarium from 1909 until his death in 1936; he also served as secretary and treasurer.
His father, Benjamin Brewster, opened the first hotel in Lake Placid, "Brewsters" in 1871, according to Frances Brewster's obituary.
Brewster's daughters, opened a women's clothing shop in Lake Placid, the Frances Brewster Shop, in 1929 in Lake Placid. The business eventually grew into a chain, the Frances Brewster Ladies Apparel Shops in New York and Florida; the Lake Placid store burned to the ground in 1981. She built the Lake Placid Howard Johnsons in the early 1950s. Frances Brewster also bought the Lake Placid railroad station and donated it to the Lake Placid-North Elba Historical Society.
New York Times , March 12, 1936
G. S. BREWSTER, 67, FINANCIER, IS DEAD
Philanthropist, Stricken While on Vacation at the Jekyl Island Club in Georgia.
EX-CREW CAPTAIN AT YALE
Served as Leader in Senior Year in 1891—Head of the Home for Incurables.
George S. Brewster of 740 Park Avenue, a financier who had been prominent in organized philanthropy in New York for many years, died unexpectedly yesterday of a heart attack while on a vacation at the Jekyl Island Club, Jekyl Island, Ga. of which he was vice president.
Mr. Brewster, a son of the late Benjamin Brewster, early Standard Oil executive, and Elmina Dows Brewster, was 67 years old. In addition to his widow, the former Eleanor G. Bosher, he is survived by four children, Benjamin, Edward C., Frances and Katharine Brewster; a sister, Mrs. O. G. Jennings, all of this city, and two brothers, Robert, also of New York, who is vice president of the Metropolitan Opera and Real Estate Company, and Frederick of New Haven.
Mr. Brewster was president of the Home for Incurables, 183d Street and Third Avenue, the Bronx; a trustee and former president of the Provident Loan Society, 436 Fourth Avenue; a trustee and former treasurer of the Trudeau Sanitarium at Saranac Lake, N. Y., and a director and former chairman of the building committee of the Nassau Hospital and a director of the Association for Improving the Condition of the Poor.
He was a director of the Industrial Alcohol Corporation and the Piping Rock Realty Company. He graduated from Yale, where he was captain of the crew, in 1891. Among his clubs were the Union, University, Turf and Field, Racquet and Tennis and Piping Rock. He belonged to the Society of Mayflower Descendants through his descent from Elder William Brewster.
Comments
2013-04-21 15:10:57 I believe the Brewster sisters, his daughters, ran a womens' clothing shop in Lake Placid (called Frances Brewster, I think) and bought and donated the railroad station there to the Lake Placid-North Elba Historical Society. —MaryHotaling
