The property remained in the Drewe family
until it was sold in 1903 to Henry Bowden Gundry, along with an estate of about
3300 acres. Given the size of the estate, it was hard to find a buyer who could
afford to keep up such a large property. Due to the nationwide agricultural
depression of the 1920s, Gundry was near bankruptcy when he died in 1929. His
heirs were forced to sell off part of the estate to maintain the rest.
Probably a few years prior to Gundry’s
death, the house’s famous paneled oak drawing room (also called the music
room) was removed from the house and sold to famous art dealer, Charles Duveen’s
New York branch of Charles of London. At this time, it was the fashion for wealthy
Americans to buy up “antiquities” to install in American homes.
The room was eventually purchased by the newspaper magnate and art collector,
William Randolph Hearst. Hearst purchased art in such massive quantities that
it is no surprise that the room from The Grange sat crated up in a warehouse
in the Bronx for over a decade. Dr. Preston Pope Satterwhite eventually purchased
the room in 1943 as a gift to the museum in honor of his friend Hattie Bishop
Speed.
