Valentine Hall Jr.

Valentine Gill Hall Jr. (March 27, 1834 – July 17, 1880) was an American socialite, banker, and merchant who was the maternal grandfather of First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt. and Susan Hall, Tonnelé. Another sister, Catherine Tonnelé Hall, was married to Eugene Schieffelin, and a brother, John Tonnelé Hall, was married to Catherine Cruger Delafield, daughter of Rufus King Delafield, and niece of merchants Richard Delafield and Edward Delafield.

His maternal grandparents were Rebecca (née Waterbury) Tonnelé, and John Tonnelé Sr, a Frenchman. His uncle was John Tonnelé Jr., the farmer and politician who was a member of the New Jersey State Legislature, and his grandmother Rebecca was the daughter of Revolutionary War General David How Waterbury, Jr.

Career His father and his maternal grandfather were business partners in the New York City wool merchant firm of Tonnelé & Hall, Through their firm, Hall's father was able to build a large fortune, estimated at $250,000 in 1842, After his grandfather retired, his uncle, John Tonnelé Jr. ran the business with his father, who retired in 1845 before age 50. in a marriage that "...united a member of a prominent New York merchantile family with Hudson River gentry". Mary was the daughter of Dr. Edward Hunter Ludlow, another business partner of Hall's father, and Elizabeth (née Livingston) Ludlow, the granddaughter of the 11th Lieutenant Governor of New York, Edward Philip Livingston, and the great-granddaughter of Chancellor Robert Livingston, of the Livingston family. After the death of her parents, Valentine brought the family to live at the Ludlow home in Clermont, New York (five miles north of Tivoli), building a Second Empire-style 8,375-square-foot mansion called Oak Terrace on Woods Road (also known as "The Oaks" or "Oak Lawn") in 1872 next to the house of his brother-in-law,

Anna Rebecca Hall (1863–1892), who married Elliott Roosevelt (1860–1894), the son of Theodore Roosevelt Sr. and brother of U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, in 1883. Valentine Gill Hall III (1867–1934), a champion tennis player. who married Josephine Booraen Zabriskie (1878–1912), daughter of Augustus Zabriskie, in 1898. His widow, who maintained various New York homes at 11 West 37th Street and 20 Gramercy Park (next door to Stuyvesant Fish at 19 Gramercy Park), also died at their Hudson Valley estate on August 14, 1919, at the age of 77.

Descendants Through his eldest daughter Anna, he was the grandfather of First Lady of the United States Anna Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962), who married her fifth cousin Franklin Delano Roosevelt (later President of the United States); Elliott Roosevelt, Jr. (1889–1893), who died young; and Gracie Hall Roosevelt (1891–1941).