NYC EATS

 “My 25 best customers” – Charles Rector, restauranteur

No collection of New York’s most famous foods would be complete without including New York’s most famous eaters. And no one could compete with this dazzling duo of bottomless gourmands.

Diamond Jim (so-called due to his ever-present display of glittering jewels) and Lillian (the most popular performer of her time) would regularly sock away enormous meals together, to the shock and delight of a curious public. Brady himself would usually consume dozens of oysters, then a tableful of live crabs, a double portion of turtle soup, 6 or 7 lobsters, a brace of canvasback ducks, a huge steak piled with veal cutlets, and a 2-pound box of chocolates, all in one sitting, washed down with a gallon of orange juice (he was a teetotaler). When Jim pointed at a tray of French pastries, he didn’t mean any particular piece, he wanted the whole tray. Lillian could gamely match him lobster-for-lobster, steak-for-steak. Their nightly repasts at the city’s luxurious “Lobster Palaces,” like Rector’s and Churchill’s, became a spectator sport for fellow millionaires, celebrities and journalists.

Some might think these two were just a pair of disgusting gluttons, but a deeper look at their story is quite revealing. (Select to enlarge:)

Diamond Jim was born James Buchanan Brady in 1856, over his father’s saloon on Cedar Street. Growing up in Manhattan’s toughest waterfront district among the stench of slaughterhouses, the portly young boy faced daily gang violence, which appalled him. He refused to fight, and developed an amiable, generous, honest personality instead, which served him well throughout his life. Jim Brady vowed to escape poverty, and became one of the top salesmen of his generation. He attracted deal-makers with his jovial charm and fun-loving spirit. Jim was soon a millionaire and a jolly “bon vivant,” strolling in his frock coat and silk hat, glittering with precious stones on his fingers, cuffs, buttons, lapels, and a 3-carat diamond on the top of his cane. His motto was, “If you’re going to make money, you have to look like money.”

Lillian Russell, a corn-fed Iowa girl, was born Helen Louise Leonard in 1861 to a mother who was a staunch feminist and a father who was a retiring publisher. She was an exquisite youngster with an incomparable voice, who yearned to be an opera star. At age 17 her mother took her to New York to train for grand opera under Dr. Leopold Damrosch. But her statuesque figure drew the attention of stage impresario Tony Pastor, who changed her name to Lillian Russell (“I loved all the L’s in it,” Lillian quipped) and cast her in light operas by Gilbert and Sullivan, such as H.M.S. Pinafore and The Pirates of Penzance. From the moment she sang her first note, she brought down the house. Lillian quickly became the top box office attraction in America, earning $2,000 a night, paid immediately in cash. Not only could she hit an impossible eight high C’s at every show, her voluptuous hourglass shape and sexual magnetism made her the most lusted-after woman in the world. Dozens of bouquets laden with jewels and cash would be delivered to her dressing room at every performance, though she returned almost all of them.

Jim and Lillian met at the Columbian Exposition (the Chicago World’s Fair) in 1893, where Lillian was performing. They instantly became constant companions, and despite the fair’s breathtaking architecture and captivating amusements, they were the star attraction of the Expo. So began a lifelong platonic friendship in the public spotlight.

Their fame arrived at the height of the Gilded Age, a time of overnight millionaires, ravishing parties, and conspicuous consumption, despite the abject poverty endured by many city dwellers. Husky men symbolized money, power and security, while hefty, buxom women with minuscule waistlines exuded both sensuality and domesticity. Their home turf was the Great White Way: Broadway between Madison Square (23rd Street) and Longacre Square (later to be renamed Times Square, at 42nd Street.) Ablaze nightly with Edison’s new light bulbs, crowded with gawkers, pleasure-seekers, Floradora girls and “Stage Door Johnnys,” crammed with hundreds of theaters, plush restaurants, ritzy hotels and cabarets, Broadway at the turn of the century was New York’s world-renowned, scandal-ridden center of attention. And there you would find Diamond Jim and his dining companion Lillian most every night, strolling arm-in-arm in the gaze of the throngs, Jim whispering to her, “Ain’t it grand, Nell?”

Although Diamond Jim was constantly handing out expensive jewelry to women, he never married, nor did he have a family or many true friends. He was lonely and self-conscious about his appearance, believing he had to “buy” companionship. As John Burke, author of Duet in Diamonds puts it, “He had everything money could buy, but literally nothing of what it couldn’t buy.” But Lillian appreciated him for who he was: sensitive, big-hearted and completely honest. For a woman who suffered through four failed marriages, Jim was the only man she could truly trust; he would never take advantage of her, and didn’t need her fame or riches. There are glowing descriptions of Lillian’s personality. Her friend, the actress Marie Dressler, called her, “One of the most generous and gifted women...as lovable as she was lovely.” Another described her as “A woman of great charm and amiability, wholly without affectation.” She seemed to be unspoiled by success, and never exhibited the temper-tantrums other famous actresses displayed. Jim considered Lillian his most precious jewel of all. They both felt loved and appreciated by each other. Even though they were just friends, that was enough for both of them. (Select to enlarge:)

Stories of the dynamic dining duo’s exploits are legendary. There was the time at a posh restaurant when Jim bet Lillian he could eat more than her. After visiting the ladies’ room to remove her whalebone corsets, she returned to their table and won the bet (or did Jim let her win?) When Lillian took up bicycling to lose weight, Jim decided to join her, and had gold-plated bicycles made for them, hers encrusted with diamonds and emeralds on the handlebars, and ruby and sapphire spokes...what a sight they made tooling around Central Park. While Jim was the first New Yorker to own an automobile (the sight of which caused a huge traffic jam on Fifth Avenue), Lillian was chosen to make the first long-distance phone call using Alexander Graham Bell’s new invention, singing to President Grover Cleveland. And then there was the time when Jim rashly proposed marriage to Lillian, dropping a million dollars in cash on her lap as a wedding present. Lillian politely refused him; Jim’s friendship was more precious to her than the money, and she was afraid it would be ruined by wedlock.

The most famous story may be “The Affair of the Sole Marguery.” Jim had enjoyed this seafood dish at the Cafe Marguery in Paris, and demanded Charles Rector recreate it in his New York restaurant. Since the Cafe Marguery’s chef was the only person who knew the secret to preparing it, Rector pulled his son George out of his third year in Cornell Law School and sent him to Paris, telling him not to return without the recipe. George nabbed a job as the Cafe’s dishwasher, and after two years of snooping and spying, sailed back to New York. Jim Brady was waiting for him on the dock, asking “Did you get it?” The question was answered that night when George prepared perfect Sole Marguery, and Jim consumed nine portions. The incident also ended George Rector’s law career; he had fallen in love with cooking, eventually earning the prestigious Cordon Bleu.

When Diamond Jim reached his fifties the weight finally began to affect his health. One night he was rushed to Johns Hopkins Hospital In Baltimore with severe abdominal pain. A fluoroscope revealed two surprises: his stomach was six times larger than average, and he was harboring a kidney stone of spectacular dimensions. After the doctor removed the stone, Jim recovered and was so grateful that he paid for the doctor’s first-class trip to Europe, gave fifty 2-carat diamond rings to the nurses, and funded the first specializing institution of its kind in America, the James Buchanan Brady Urological Institute at Johns Hopkins. A sister institution is located at New York-Presbyterian Hospital.

When doctors urged him to slow down, he replied, “Hell, I’ve got to have some fun; I haven’t much longer to live.” He was right. Diamond Jim Brady died in his sleep on April 13, 1917, at the age of 60. Thousands crowded his funeral. A heartbroken Lillian Russell wept at his coffin.

As Lillian aged, so did the public’s taste for light opera. Knowing she’d have to change to maintain her popularity, she accepted an offer from Weber and Fields, the kings of vaudeville, to appear in their raucous shows. Lillian discovered that she had a marvelous talent for comedy, being the foil in slapstick pratfalls, like Margaret Dumont in the Marx Brothers’ movies. She was more popular and happier than ever, starring in shows like “Fiddle-dee-dee,” “Hoity-Toity,” “Whoop-dee-doo,” and “Hokey Pokey,” earning legions of new fans and more money than ever before.

During her final decade Lillian devoted her talents to the cause of Womens’ Suffrage, as her mother had done. She traveled the country giving lectures, urging for women’s right to vote, being cheered for her spellbinding oratory rather than her figure. In 1917 Lillian turned her focus to the war effort, recruiting soldiers and selling War Bonds. She joined Warren G. Harding’s presidential campaign, giving 100 speeches in 15 states, and was appointed Special Commissioner of Immigration, touring Europe to study the plight of poor laborers seeking refuge. Because of these efforts, when Lillian Russell passed away on June 6, 1922, she was buried with full military honors.

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