PERU, Ind. — Cole Porter never lived in the three-story brick house his wealthy grandfather built at Westleigh Farms as a gift for his parents in 1913.
The future composer of such hit songs as "Don’t Fence Me In," "Anything Goes" and "Kiss Me Kate" graduated from Yale University that summer and set off to explore Europe, leaving his parents, Sam and Kate Cole Porter, empty-nesters. But for the next 50 years, as he moved among homes in New York, Paris, Venice and California, he dropped by for visits.
At Christmastime he sometime had an entire retinue with him, including valet and musical friends, who joined him in impromptu evening concerts. Daughters of his cousins were so thrilled they dressed in their finest and wore gloves to meet their illustrious relative.
By the time Porter died in 1964, he had inherited Westleigh Farms. All his worldly goods were sent there, overflowing the house and spilling into one of the barns. He left the farm to his cousin, Jules O. Cole, who passed it on to his son, James O. "Jim" Cole (named for the progenitor who built the house). Jim and his wife, Alice, lived in the big house for many years.
"It was always a happy place," their granddaughter, Polly Kubesch Dobbs, recalls. "They had a Victrola that kept the house filled with music."
Dobbs grew up at the farm next door that Mrs. Jules O. Cole pronounced "good enough" when her husband purchased it in 1904. Good Enough stuck and is now proudly painted on one of the barns.
Between Good Enough and Westleigh the Cole family had 2,500 acres of rolling farmland dedicated to row crops, pasture and Angus cattle. Dobbs’ parents, Joanne "Joey" Cole and Sid Kubesch (a retired Air Force officer who still holds a world record for flying a supersonic bomber from Tokyo to London in 8 hours, 35 minutes) managed both farms.
When it was time to clear the house and barn of the singer’s personal possessions, aunts, uncles and cousins all wanted something that had belonged to him. Dobbs, an attorney specializing in estate and wealth transfer, recalled putting items into packets containing both high- and low-value items and then drawing lots on them: "One of my aunts ended up with a Salvador Dali painting and a milkshake maker."
No one lived in the grand old house for six years after Alice died, but a maid routinely cleaned the house and an insect treatment company kept infestation at bay. But nothing prevented Sid from having a minor stroke.
It was then his daughter realized he was the only person who knew how to manage the operation. When he asked his five children to return to the farm, Dobbs, the youngest, was the only one who agreed to move back – if a family succession agreement was in place.
"One farm and five kids just wouldn’t work," she noted.
With the ultimate goal of keeping the family farm in the family and by working with her parents and siblings, Dobbs created a succession agreement in which she and her husband, Steve, own the big house in which the indomitable Kate Cole Porter once reigned as the area’s premier hostess. Steve spent eight years working with his father-in-law in preparation for becoming farm manager.
Dobbs and her siblings are factored into an agreement she said each considers fair. "If we have a good crop, we all rejoice," she said. "If it’s a bad season, we share the unhappiness. Each of us has a say regarding the farm’s operation and any decision to sell it."
By the time the Dobbs and their children moved to the farm in 2011, they had updated the house with central air and rewired it. Some of the lighting fixtures that once graced Cole Porter’s Paris home now highlight furniture left behind by Jim and Alice. Drawers open to reveal Kate’s carefully printed dinner invitations that included maps to Westleigh.
Porter’s passion for having his name embroidered on all his belongings shows up in handkerchiefs, bed linens and napkins either folded into drawers or used as wall hangings. Still, Dobbs is adamant when she says, "This is not a museum. It’s our home."
Best of all, the succession agreement was in place when Sid became seriously ill and experienced a long recovery period. The family farm remains in the family six generations after the first J.O. Cole established it. The Dobbs children are the seventh generation to call Westleigh home.
"The time to execute a succession agreement is when everyone is breathing and when everyone still has their marbles," Dobbs said.
The only time she has a "what-if moment" is when she takes a day off from her Logansport law office to spend time at home in sweats and with her hair in a ponytail. "That’s when I find myself thinking, ‘What would fashionable Kate Porter say about me?’" she mused.
