Almost every day the strange figure, swathed in ancient black, might be seen walking down the street toward the Chemical National Bank. There she went directly to the vault, pulled out the trunks and bags that were stored for her under a staircase, and sat cross-legged on the floor rummaging through the masses of papers and documents that represented her fortune of more than fifty million dollars.

Her hands and face became smudged with dirt while she clipped coupons from a great pile of bonds and put them into a basket at her side. This work was too important to be interrupted by lunch; when she was hungry she reached into a pocket of the black dress and drew out an unwrapped ham sandwich. Beneath the folds of that garment she wore a petticoat in which were sewn a number of deep pockets, each big enough to hold the contents of a safe-deposit box (one day she arrived at the bank carrying $200,000 in negotiable bonds); beneath the petticoat, on a cold winter’s day, were newspapers that she had fashioned (after reading) into extra underclothes. Around her waist was a chain from which hung keys to safe-deposit boxes all over the country; in New York City alone, in addition to the space so generously allotted her at the Chemical National, she had eleven boxes at the Safety Deposit Company.

In the early 1990’s America had an unusually colorful grade of millionaire, but Hetty Green—the Witch of Wall Street—had more eccentricities than most. During those years when Vanderbilts, Belmonts, Goulds, Astors, and others were building lavish palaces, putting their riches on display, Hetty Green was living under a variety of assumed names in a series of cheap boardinghouses in order to save money and escape the tax assessor. One fall she took a room in Far Rockaway; it was several hours from the city by ferry and train, and she had to wear fishermen’s boots for the walk to the station through the sand, but since it was out of season the rent was only five dollars a week. Sometimes she had a room in the Bowery, or a third-floor-rear hall bedroom in Brooklyn, or a walk-up in Harlem (there was no icebox and her meat spoiled—a loss she complained about for years). Often she spent only one night at a place, arriving with so little luggage that landladies asked her to pay in advance. She was living in Hoboken, New Jersey, under the name of Dewey (her dog’s name) when officials discovered who she was and learned that the dog was unlicensed. When they tried to collect the two-dollar fee she moved to a friend’s apartment in New York.

Once she boarded a streetcar and gave the conductor half a dollar. He looked at the coin and handed it back; it was counterfeit. She had no more money in her pocketbook, but a postman who was on the car recognized her and vouched for