Thomas Newbold (1849-1929)

He was born in New York City and was a first cousin of the celebrated novelist Edith Wharton, their mother's being sisters. He was educated in New York and read law at Trinity College, Cambridge, in England. Returning to the States, he worked as a lawyer and in 1874 graduated from the Columbia Law School. He was elected to the New York State Senate as a Democrat, representing Dutchess, Columbia & Putnam counties; and, the following year he took the post of President of the New York State Department of Health which he held until the 1890s. In 1880, he married Sarah Coolidge, daughter of T. Jefferson Coolidge of Boston, a leading Republican who like his great-grandfather, U.S. President Thomas Jefferson, had also been U.S. Ambassador to France. The Newbolds were prominent members of society and part of Mrs Astor's "400". During the Spring and Fall they lived at Bellefield in Hyde Park, New York. They divided the rest of their year between New York City, Newport, Maine and Europe. He had 3 children.