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Rooftop Farm On A Luxury Hotel
- William Earle Stokes kept a rooftop "sky farm" with chickens, pigs, geese and even a small bear atop the Ansonia.
- The health department shut it down in 1907, though Stokes kept chickens in his apartment afterward.
Copper Wealth Built The Ansonia
- The Ansonia was funded by copper wealth from the Phelps Dodge dynasty and named after Anson Phelps's enterprises.
- W.E.D. Stokes used that fortune to create an outsize Beaux-Arts residential hotel on the Upper West Side.
Stokes's Scandalous Personal Life
- Stokes married 19-year-old Rita de Acosta in 1895 and their marriage quickly disintegrated amid scandals.
- He focused on building the Ansonia and pursued numerous public feuds and litigious battles throughout his life.