From a Wall Street Journal story by Katherine Clarke headlined “The Longtime New York Home of Barbara Walters Lists for $19.75 Million”:
After the death of pioneering TV journalist Barbara Walters in December, her longtime New York home is coming on the market for $19.75 million.
The Upper East Side apartment is located in the white-glove cooperative 944 Fifth Avenue, next to Central Park. Ms. Walters lived there for about 30 years, until her death at age 93, according to listing agent Alexa Lambert of Compass.
The 11-room home has changed little since Ms. Walters lived there and remains filled with collectible pieces, including antiques, art and sentimental mementos from her life, Ms. Lambert said. An attorney for Ms. Walters’s estate declined to comment about whether the furniture and décor are available for sale.
While the home is currently configured with two bedrooms, it could easily be converted to as many as four, Ms. Lambert said. The home’s living room has three large picture windows overlooking Central Park, as well as a wood-burning fireplace and a baby grand piano. There is also a formal dining room.
Ms. Walters’ dressing room is swathed in red lacquer, with a mirrored wall, a dressing table and lounge space. The primary bedroom suite has wood paneling, built-in wardrobes painted with floral motifs, a bed canopy of decorative fabric and a corner table with views over the park. A small sitting room off the living room has a writing desk and cushioned window seats.
Ms. Walters wrote in her 2008 memoir that she entertained frequently in the apartment and courted potential interviewees there. Monica Lewinsky came to dine at the apartment at least twice before agreeing to sit down for an interview about the Bill Clinton sex scandal, Ms. Walters wrote. On the evening the interview aired, in March 1999, Ms. Walters had producers of the show and a few friends over to watch, she recounted in the book. She had made a fire, but the flue wasn’t open and the room began to fill with smoke. The fire department had to be called. “It was an inflammatory evening in more ways than one,” she wrote.
Ms. Walters was the first woman anchor of both a morning and an evening television-news program and at one point was the highest-paid TV-news personality in the country, interviewing celebrities, public figures and presidents. She also developed and starred in the long-running ABC daytime talk show “The View.” She was married four times, including twice to television producer Merv Adelson, and had one child, daughter Jacqueline Danforth.
The prewar building at 944 Fifth Avenue, built in Italian Renaissance palazzo style, spans 14 stories, with just one apartment per floor, Ms. Lambert said. The property has been home to many big-name residents over the years, including one-time Los Angeles Dodgers owner Frank McCourt, who paid $50 million for his unit there in 2012.
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