Editing PAB Widener (section)

== Art Collection and Estate ==

Widener's art collecting, which began in the 1880s and continued until his death, assembled masterpieces whose value has multiplied enormously since his purchases. His acquisitions of Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Raphael, and other Old Masters created a collection rivaling those of European aristocracy. His purchases at the 1892 Secretan sale in Paris, and his subsequent acquisitions from British aristocrats liquidating family holdings, demonstrated the shift of cultural property from Old World to New that American wealth enabled.<ref name="strouse"/>

His Lynnewood Hall estate in Elkins Park, designed by Horace Trumbauer and completed in 1900, provided the palatial setting his collection required. The 110-room mansion, surrounded by extensive grounds, represented domestic architecture on a scale that even Gilded Age Americans rarely attempted. The galleries designed to display his paintings created museum-quality spaces within a residential setting. The estate's decline following the family's departure, and its current uncertain status, demonstrates the difficulty of maintaining such properties beyond their original context.<ref name="baltzell"/>

His son Joseph, whose collecting continued after P.A.B.'s death, eventually donated the collection to the National Gallery of Art in Washington, where it remains one of the museum's foundational holdings. The donation, made after Joseph's death in 1943, followed his wishes that the collection remain together in public hands rather than dispersing at auction. The Widener family's contribution to the National Gallery, including both artworks and funds for construction, established their permanent memorial in the nation's capital.<ref name="strouse"/>