Early Life and Charitable Activities

Leonie Alexandre was born in 1890, the daughter of James Joseph Alexandre, a steamship magnate, and Nathalie Edsall Alexandre. She grew up at Nirvana, the family estate on the Stamford waterfront, which became a setting for many Alexandre family gatherings and charitable events.

From an early age, Leonie displayed an artistic and philanthropic temperament. On March 20, 1909, she participated in a Chocolatière et Tableaux at the Plaza Hotel, a charity event at which “chocolate and other refreshments [were] sold by women and girls in chocolatière costumes after the famous painting in the Dresden Gallery.” The painting referred to was La Belle Chocolatière by Jean-Étienne Liotard. Later that same month she performed as an Egyptian dancer in another benefit for working girls’ dancing classes hosted by sculptor François Tonetti and his wife, Mary Trimble Lawrence Tonetti. In March 1910, Leonie took part in The Castle of Liguria during the Italian Carnival held at the Waldorf Astoria.

Marriage and Wedding Festivities

Leonie’s engagement to Francis Jenkins Danforth, an industrial engineer, was announced in the spring of 1911. Her fiancé gave his bachelor dinner at Delmonico’s on May 19, where, according to The New York Times, “a colored band” played. The couple was married on May 27, 1911, in St. John’s Episcopal Church in Stamford, Connecticut. The wedding, performed by the Rev. Charles Morris Addison, was followed by a reception at Nirvana, her mother’s estate, attended by about three hundred guests, most arriving from New York on a special train.

From the New York Times wedding report:

“Miss Alexandre’s brother, Jerome Alexandre, gave her in marriage. ... Miss Alexandre’s maid of honor was Miss Gertrude Slocum, her cousin, of New York. ... The bride’s gown was of white satin. She wore a lace veil and her flowers were lilies of the valley and gardenias. After a fortnight away Mr. and Mrs. Danforth will return to New York, and in the summer they will be at Nirvana.”

Inheritance and Celebration of Majority

Like her brother Jerome, Leonie inherited a considerable fortune—$1,500,000 (equivalent to about $40,000,000 in 2025 dollars)—upon reaching her majority. Yet her response to newfound wealth reflected her generous nature.

A contemporary newspaper account recorded:

“Mrs. Frank Danforth, who was Leonie Alexandre, adopted a novel method of celebrating the attainment of majority. Instead of giving a great dinner or a ball for her friends of social prominence, she called together the employees at her mother’s big estate, Nirvana, at Stamford, Conn., and told them to make preparations for a barn dance. ... There were present upward of 150 young men and young women, friends and acquaintances of the employees… Mrs. Danforth and her guests danced and ‘mixed’ with their employees until the affair ended at 3 in the morning.”

Later Life and Civic Engagement

Throughout her long life, Leonie Danforth continued to devote herself to charitable, artistic, and social causes. She helped organize and support numerous events, including Will Rogers’s benefit appearance in 1928, an exhibition of Edward VII’s coronation robes in 1937, and several productions by Snark, a New York amateur dramatic society, in 1939.

Death

Leonie Alexandre Danforth lived to the age of 101, dying on May 18, 1992. She was remembered as a gracious and public-spirited woman whose life spanned more than a century of Alexandre family history—from the steamship era of her grandfather’s time to the modern world of the late twentieth century.