Named in 1887 on the Abbot & Margaret tract, referring to landowners Abbot Kinney – yes, the same guy who founded Venice – and his first wife Margaret. “Constance” thus honors Kinney’s sister Constance Elizabeth (c. 1838-1915), the only daughter of Franklin Sherwood and Mary Cogswell Kinney. Born in either New York or New Jersey – accounts vary – Constance grew up around the Washington, D.C. elite, as her aunt Elizabeth was married to Sen. James Dixon and was close friends with Mary Todd Lincoln; indeed, Constance was among the select visitors to Abraham Lincoln’s deathbed. In 1872, two years after a reported engagement to U.S. Chief Justice Salmon P. Chase, Constance married Count Cesare Gianotti (1836-1913), who belonged to another court: the royal court of Italy. Gianotti was master of ceremonies for King Umberto I and then, after Umberto’s 1900 assassination, palace prefect for King Vittorio Emanuele III. Known in her adopted country as Contessa Gianotti, Constance spent the rest of her life as a Roman socialite, living in the opulent Palazzo Colonna and raising her daughters Marcella and Maria.
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