Greene was born Belle Marion Greener on December 13, 1883, in Washington, D. C. , the third of five children and second daughter of Richard Greene and Genevieve (Van Vliet) Greene. Her determined reticence about her antecedents, her olive complexion, and the name da Costa led to the widely held assumption that she was foreign born; da Costa was her maternal grandmother's name.
The Greene children received their schooling in Princeton, New Jersey, where their Virginia-born mother, apparently separated from her husband, supported them by giving music lessons. A college education was beyond their limited means.
Greene went to work at the Princeton University library. She served her apprenticeship in the cataloguing and reference departments, soon showing her budding passion for rare and beautiful books and manuscripts. Ernest C. Richardson, the university librarian and professor of bibliography, was the first of several mentors from whom she eagerly learned her craft. Vivacious and attractive, she drew the attention of a Princeton man, Junius Spencer Morgan, a collector of manuscripts and rare books. His uncle, J. Pierpont Morgan, needed someone to take charge of his splendid but haphazard collection of rare books and manuscripts, soon to be housed in a new building. Belle Greene began work at the Pierpont Morgan Library in 1905, and for three years she guided the collecting and organizing of the coordinated treasures that made it one of the world's greatest libraries. Greene and Morgan soon proved deeply compatible, and by 1908 she had acquired so much knowledge and responsibility that he sent her abroad as his agent. In England she came under the sympathetic tutelage of Sydney Cockerell, director of the Fitzwilliam Museum at Cambridge University, who also furnished her with introductions to the foremost European scholars. Increasing in confidence and with a sure feel for the quality of a rare object, she nonetheless never decided on the desirability of an acquisition without seeking the opinion of experts. The final decision to purchase was always Morgan's. She was soon known and respected in museums, galleries, libraries, and aristocratic houses all over Europe. It was during the appraisal of the estate following Morgan's death in 1913 that she met Bernard Berenson, who became an important influence and a lifelong friend. J. P. Morgan, Jr. , was at first indifferent to enlarging the collection, and Greene became involved in World War I work with characteristic intensity. Having brought her mother with her to New York, she now took into her home a war-widowed sister, whose son, Robert Mackenzie Leveridge, was born there. When the sister remarried, Belle Greene legally adopted the child. By 1920, Morgan had become interested in enriching and enlarging the collection, and Greene soon resumed her professional trips to Europe. Then, in 1924, Morgan incorporated the library as an educational institution dedicated to the memory of his father. Greene was named director, a position she held until her retirement on November 30, 1948. The new status of the library called for a revised orientation: the organization of its material for service to scholarship, a task for which Greene revealed a special genius, had to be equal in importance to the continuing expansion of the collections. Her dedication to making the library useful resulted in a generous lending policy and information and photographic services, which made its resources world famous. In addition, innumerable visiting scholars from around the world found that she personally took a ready and discerning interest in their work. Belle Greene's standing as one of the great figures in the art and bibliophile world earned her wide recognition. The French, Belgian, and Italian governments decorated her. She was named to the Committee for the Restoration of the University of Louvain Library, the Librarian's Advisory Council of the Library of Congress, and the advisory board of the Index Society, and served as a consultant to the trustees of the Walters Art Gallery in Baltimore. She also served on the editorial boards of the Gazette des Beaux-Arts and Art News. Although a mishap resulting in a broken arm had made her increasingly fearful of falling, she continued for some time to go daily to the library after her retirement. At sixty-six she died of cancer in New York. Funeral services were held at St. Thomas Church (Episcopal), of which she was a member, and her ashes were buried in Kensico Cemetery, Valhalla, New York.
Fellow of the Mediaeval Academy of America, fellow of the Metropolitan Museum of New York
Short, gray-eyed, and black-haired, Belle da Costa Greene had a vivid personality and a strong sense of her role. When representing the Morgans abroad, she wore couturier clothes and patronized luxury hotels; while working in the library in her early years, she dressed in Renaissance gowns with appropriate jewelry. She was witty, racy in her speech, unconventional, and impulsive, and could be witheringly imperious when faced with pretentiousness and pomposity. She made and kept friends easily, and she inspired loyalty and dedication in her staff.
Greene never married, however, and her most lasting romantic relationship was with the Renaissance Italian art expert Bernard Berenson.
He was an American financier and banker who dominated corporate finance and industrial consolidation in the United States of America in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
He was an American banker, finance executive, and philanthropist.
