Harry Coster

Henry Arnold Coster ( – November 2, 1917) was an American clubman who was prominent in New York Society during the Gilded Age.

Early life Coster was the son of Daniel Joachim Coster and Julia (née DeLancey) Coster (1806–1890), who married in 1835 and lived at 234 West 14th Street. They established the family estate in Westchester (which became part of the Bronx in 1895).

His paternal grandparents were Catherine Margaret (née Holsman) Coster and John Gerard Coster, who came to the United States shortly after the Revolutionary War from Haarlem in the Netherlands and founded the family fortune with his brother through the mercantile firm, "Henry A. & John G. Coster", and died in 1844. His grandparents had twelve children that married into many prominent families including the Schermerhorns and Heckshers. and his aunt was Georgiana Louisa Coster, who married Charles August Heckscher.

His maternal grandfather was Oliver Delancey of the Delancey family, which was one of the oldest families in New York state. Conveniently, 400 was the number of people that could fit into Mrs. Astor's ballroom. Coster was a member of the St. Nicholas Society.

The Coster's spent their summers in Newport, Rhode Island. His wife, who was prominent in society in Boston before their marriage, Mary served as vice-president of the Home for Incurables in Fordham. Coster was married to Mary Lee Coles (–1922). She was the daughter of Isaac Underhill Coles and Martha Ellery (née Jones) Coles, who married in Boston in July 1823. Her sister, Grace Coles was married to Edward Templeton Snelling. They lived in New York at 2 East 41st Street and at their country home, known as "St. Adresse", in Westchester County, New York. who married Frederick S. Wombwell, a British citizen living in Asheville, North Carolina, in 1923. They lived at Keewaydin in Tenafly, New Jersey.

Coster died at his country home in Westchester on November 2, 1917. His widow, who had a summer home in Southampton, New York known as "Wee Cot", died in November 1922 at her residence, 50 East 81st Street, which she inherited from her husband. Her funeral was held at St. James' Episcopal Church on Madison Avenue and she was buried alongside her husband at the Coster family vault in the churchyard of St. Peter's Church in the Village of Westchester (which is now the East Bronx). To this day, St. Benedict's School stands on the same site.