George I. Seney

George Ingraham Seney (May 12, 1826 – April 7, 1893) was a New York City banker, art collector, and benefactor.

[1] He is best remembered for amassing a substantial collection of pre-Impressionist 19th-century European and American paintings,[1] some of which he gave to the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

He was a descendant of Joshua Seney, who represented Maryland in the Continental Congress, and Frances "Fanny" (née Nicholson) Seney (a daughter of James W. Nicholson, who was one of the first commodores in the United States Navy).

As president of the Metropolitan Bank in New York City, Seney was situated to become a financier of newly chartered railroads.

[9] In 1871, Seney acquired the Hampton House boarding house in Bernardsville, New Jersey from Francis Oliver, feeling the home and area could be developed and attract even more visitors to the area.

On May 6, 1908, just a few weeks before the season opening, a fire broke out and the Inn burned down, leaving the 20 chimneys and little else.

Together, they lived at 4 Montague Terrace in Brooklyn and were the parents of ten children,[1] including: Seney died of heart disease at the Grand Hotel on Broadway and 31st Street in New York City on April 7, 1893.

[20] When Dakota Territory representative (and later South Dakota senator) Richard F. Pettigrew traveled east in the late 1870s to find investors for a flour milling venture in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, Seney was interested and helped bankroll the Queen Bee mill, which ruins still stand above the city's namesake falls.