After Natalie's birth in 1913, the family moved into a brownstone on East 17th Street where Chester Beach established a large sculpture studio to practice his art.
[3] The family spent summers in the upstate New York towns of North Salem and Southeast[1] where Eleanor developed an attachment for rural communities that she would cherish and protect for all of her days.
It was at this time that Chester Beach met Erastus Tefft, a Wall Street financier with a country estate on Starr Ridge Road.
[3] The property was named Oldwalls to memorialize its construction materials[3] and it stands today as an integral part of the Starr Ridge/Starr Lea Historic district.
Chester needed to be near the marble quarries of Carrara, Italy that provided the raw materials for a large fountain and zodiac statues group for the new terrace at the Cleveland Museum of Art.
[4] In NYC she had a long-term involvement with the Women's Prison Association and was on the board of its Hopper Home, a half way house for recently released offenders,[1] for which she created a fund raising thrift shop.
[3] He flew directly there in July while Eleanor led the children, aged 15, 12, and 8, through Europe and Egypt from where they took a freighter for a slow voyage on to Burma.
[3] Chester Beach died in 1956 and, following the death of his wife Eleanor in 1965, occupancy of the Oldwalls property fell to the Fitchens, who continued to use it as a weekend and summer residence.
[3] Eleanor and Judge Tuttle established a work release program of court designated community service for youthful offenders though an arrangement made with the Putnam County Sheriff's office.
At Eleanor's memorial, one of her granddaughters related that "when working in Boston as a catering manager, I was sitting with clients at a menu-tasting making small talk.
[1] Eleanor then spearheaded the campaigns to add these and other Putnam County structures to the New York State Landmarks and National Register of Historic Places.
[3] In 1969, the couple founded Southeast Open Spaces, Inc. [SOS] to preserve and protect natural resources through ownership of sensitive lands, property easements and environmental education.
It is now one of the oldest land trusts in New York State with an inventory of more than 500 acres (2.0 km2) of diverse habitat with nearly every parcel accessible to the public via well maintained trails.
[3] The memorial service held in her honor at the Old Southeast Church on June 20, 2009, was attended by nearly all of her family members from all over the world and by numerous friends from all walks of life.
"[5] It is a tribute to the life of this great woman and it recounts for posterity an anecdote known to most residents of Putnam County: "Devoted to safeguarding pieces of the past, Eleanor Fitchen once locked herself and a granddaughter in the Old Southeast Church on Route 22 to prevent its destruction."
It drew the press and local radio and overwhelming public support and it preserved the church which stands today, the oldest house of worship in Putnam County.
Her daughters, Elli and Anne, gathered together countless papers, booklets, correspondence, leaflets, posters and other ephemera of Eleanor's lifetime of community involvement.