The evening of June 25, 1906 in New York City was sweltering, even by the city’s summer standards. While many had followed the ageless tradition of fleeing to beachier climes, a posh set of nearly 1,000 had stayed in the city to gather atop Madison Square Garden (version two of what would eventually be four) for the rooftop theater’s grand reopening and the inaugural performance of “Mam’Zelle Champagne.” (It was a bubbly dud, though, by all accounts, not because of what happened next.)
In an act that would put any of today’s rogue cell phone rings mid-show to shame, one man stood up towards the end of the performance and shot another three times, though Stanford White was dead by bullet two. The murder of the prominent architect would turn out to be one of the most infamous crimes and ensuing trials of the century. The entire country stayed glued to their daily newspapers, voraciously following along as secrets were spilled and the drama was splashed across the headlines.
As Manhattan society mag Avenue Magazine puts it, “In any ranking of New York society scandals, the White affair is quite possibly the all-time number one.”
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Unlike most murder trials, the biggest questions of the crime were never in doubt. There were plenty of witnesses who saw Harry Kendall Thaw commit the murder with a gun in the drawing room—ahem—the rooftop theater of the Garden. Even the motive was clear. As he was escorted from the scene of the crime, Thaw admitted that “I did it because he ruined my wife.”
But everything else was in question. How had one of New York City’s most prominent citizens ruined Thaw’s wife? Was there a seedier side to Stanford White’s life that was hidden from the public eye? And, most importantly for the verdict, was Thaw a protective husband who flew into a jealous rage at the sight of the other man, or was he insane as he would plead at trial?
“A most unfortunate accident has happened!”
Stanford White was one of the most famous architects in New York City at the time of his murder. His designs were widely celebrated during his life and many are still iconic fixtures of the cityscape. Working under the firm of McKim, Mead, and White, White designed such prominent structures as the Washington Square Arch, the Judson Memorial Church, and the Metropolitan Club. He built a Madison Avenue mansion for J.P. Morgan, which has since become the Morgan Library, and the Payne Whitney Mansion on 5th Avenue. He even designed the second iteration of Madison Square Garden, where he would eventually be killed.
“White loved to create theatrical buildings with lavish ornament and interiors where important events could cause commotion,” Richard Guy, author of McKim, Mead & White, Architects, told Avenue.
By the light of day, White was the picture of a hardworking Manhattan gentleman, if maybe a bit more colorful than the stuffy stereotype would have the public believe. But what was hidden behind the facade of a distinguished and happily (not to mention suitably—his wife was a well pedigreed 22-year-old woman of colonial heritage) married man was a life of debauchery, sexual exploitation, and profligacy.
It would later come to light that White participated in secret orgies, that he was heavily in debt, and that he preyed on very young girls trying to make it in showbiz, ones so young they would have gotten him thrown in jail today.
The latter was the case with Evelyn Nesbit, the woman at the heart of the murderous love triangle. After a hardscrabble youth, Nesbit moved with her mother from Pennsylvania to NYC at the age of 15. She quickly began to receive attention for her work as a model and a showgirl. Unfortunately, her glittering new career and glowing looks also attracted the attention of White.
White used his trademark moves on the young 16 year old. According to Nesbit’s 1914 memoirs, she met the 47-year-old man at a dinner party and, at first, got a great impression of him.
“My first experience of Mr. White was that he was very unprepossessing, that he was very kindly, and that he was safe. He did not treat me with any great ceremony, but he was courteous, attentive, and took an interest in my life.” She goes on to describe his interest in her as “almost fatherly.”
Over the course of several visits, Nesbit became more comfortable with White. Then, one day he invited her to a party that turned out to be a party of two at the secret apartment he kept apart from his family. It featured heavy dark red velvet curtains, luxurious furniture and art, and innovative mood lighting. There was also a room with a red velvet swing to match the curtains, and another swathed all in mirrors.
White poured his guest a glass of champagne and insisted she drink up. The next thing she remembered, she later testified, was waking up naked in bed with him. While Nesbit never publicly came out and named it as such, her testimony during her husband's trial made it pretty clear that she had been drugged and raped by the famous architect, and that was the impression that her future husband would get as well.
While Nesbit would continue to have a thriving career after she broke things off with White, she didn’t fare all that much better with the man she would marry five years later. Harry Kendall Thaw was from a wealthy Pittsburgh family. He was around the age of 34 when he wooed the 20-year-old ingenue into marriage while on his best behavior. It took a lot of persuasion, but once he had her tied to him “until death do us part,” he revealed his sadistic and abusive side. In one known incident, Thaw violently whipped Nesbit and it is believed that he may also have sexually abused her.
But his own behavior didn’t seem to bother him one bit. What did bother him is what Stanford White had done to his wife.
One can imagine that White was in his element on the night of June 25. He was enjoying a pleasant, if slightly warm, evening of theater in a building he had designed. While accounts differ as to the exact sequence of events of the shooting, according to several it happened during a moment that is so on the nose it wouldn’t make it through script cuts: Thaw stood up and shot his rival during a musical number entitled “I Could Love a Million Girls.”
There was confusion in the audience. Some thought the shooting was part of the show; others had no idea what was going on. The performance was abruptly ended with the understated announcement: “A most unfortunate accident has happened! The management regrets to ask that the audience leave at once, in an orderly manner. There is no danger—only an accident that will prevent a continuance of the performance.”
But when the city learned what had happened, it went wild. The story caused an uproar not just because a man who had so fastidiously protected his reputation was posthumously being exposed in colorful detail for all of his hedonism; it was also that this story of murder and depravity was stoking the moral fires of division between the working and upper classes. It also didn’t hurt that the newspaper business was going through a boom and was happy to soak up all the dollars they could get from the scandal.
The New York Journal, owned by William Randolph Hearst, wrote, “It is not merely a murder. The flash of that pistol lighted up an abyss of moral turpitude, revealing hidden features of powerful, reckless, openly flaunted wealth.”
The outcome of the murder probably didn’t help change their opinion. During his first trial, Thaw pleaded insanity and the result was a hung jury. Two years later, he was tried again and mounted an even more vigorous insanity defense that was successful. Thanks to his wealth and the strings pulled for the country’s prominent sons, he was sentenced to a very posh life in an asylum.
While Thaw would eventually gain his freedom his murder would live on in infamy. In the ensuing years, there were countless movies made and books written about the crime. And over a century later, it is still spoken about as one of the most scandalous moments in New York City’s history, the moment that produced “the trial of the century.”
