In July 1886, the Mercury of Newport, Rhode Island, reported that "Cornelius Vanderbilt... had built at his Ochre Point residence a Toy house for the pleasure of his children." The story made no comment on the architectural features of this one-story, two-room cottage: not the whimsical figures supporting the roof of its porch, its bay windows, its half-timbered gables, nor the brick chimney rising high above its low roof line (Figure 1). The cryptic note included only three other facts: the architects were Pea-body and Stearns of Boston; the builder was a Mr. McNeil, also of Boston; and the cost was $5,000.!
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