J. Hampden Robb

James Hampden Robb (October 27, 1846 – January 21, 1911) was an American merchant and politician from New York. a New Orleans banker and avid art collector who later lived in Cheviot, Ohio, and Louisa (née Werninger) Robb (1808-1855). His mother was painted in Philadelphia in 1844 by Thomas Sully, and is currently held at The Historic New Orleans Collection. His father built the Burnside Mansion in New Orleans, nicknamed the Robb's Folly, in the Garden District, which later became one of the first buildings of the newly founded Newcomb College until it was demolished in 1954.

His father's prominent business in New Orleans attracted the attention of Queen Isabella II of Spain and, with her, he formed a partnership and purchased the Havana Gas Works in Cuba. a cousin of Queen Isabella II of Spain, in 1857, thereby becoming the Marchioness de San Roman. Another sister, Charlotte Matilda Robb (1852–1902), married Dr. William Henry Pancoast (1834–1897), a surgeon in Philadelphia who was the son of Dr. Joseph Pancoast, and the other, Mary Robb (d. 1903), who married Joseph O. Miltenberger, a wealthy merchant from St. Louis,

He attended L'Institut Sillig in Vevey, Churchill's Military School in Ossining, and Harvard University,

Career From 1866 until 1886, While a member of the Senate, "he fought for the appropriation which made possible the State reservation of Niagara Falls." She was the daughter of Nathaniel Thayer, Jr. (1808–1883), a banker who built Harvard's Thayer Hall, and Cornelia Paterson (née Van Rensselaer) Thayer (1823–1897). She was the older sister of John Eliot Thayer (1862–1933), an amateur ornithologist, a granddaughter of Stephen Van Rensselaer IV and a great-granddaughter of New York Lt. Gov. Stephen Van Rensselaer III. Together, they were the parents of four children:

Nathaniel Thayer Robb (b. 1870), who married Frances Beatrix Henderson (1875–1957), daughter of Charles R. Henderson and Jennie North, in 1895. Cornelia Van Rensselaer Robb (b. 1874) who married Goodhue Livingston (1867–1951), a prominent architect, in 1896. aged 29 at her father's home.

In 1892, he moved into a house built for him by Stanford White, at 23 Park Avenue. Afterwards, from 1924 to 1977, the house was the location of the Advertising Club. Robb also had a house at North East Harbor in Maine.

Robb died at his residence, 23 Park Avenue in New York City, from a complication of diseases.

Descendants Through his son Nathaniel, he was the grandfather of Janet Henderson Robb (b. 1896); James Hampden Robb (b. 1898); and Cornelia Van Rensselaer Robb (b. 1904),

Through his daughter Louisa, he was the grandfather of Goodhue Livingston, Jr. (1897–1994), who married Joan Livingston Allen (1898–1964), the daughter of Frederick Hobbes Allen in 1919. They divorced in 1931 and in 1932 he married Lorna Mackay (1911–1986). They divorced in the 1950s and he married Ruth Monsch Gordon. They also divorced and, in 1966, he married Dorothy Michelson-Stevens-Bitter-Dick (d. 1994), the widow of William Dixon Stevens and the daughter of Albert A. Michelson. He was also the grandfather of Cornelia Thayer Livingston (1903–1975), who married Frederic Cromwell Jr. (1900–1973) in 1927.