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Title: Fortune's Children: The Fall of the House of Vanderbilt by Arthur T. Vanderbilt 2nd ISBN: 0688103863 Publisher: Quill Pub. Date: 1991 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.22
Rating: 4
Summary: A family affair
Comment: Fortune's Children was a good read for anyone interested in how the rich lived in the late 1800's. The author detailed the main characters very well as well as the over the top, outlandish homes that these characters resided in. It is truly a nice look into that era and what it all meant to be a Vanderbilt. Reading this book has piqued my interest in other books about the first rich family of America. Once I began reading this book I had trouble putting it down.
Rating: 4
Summary: Vanderbilt Voyeurism
Comment: "Fortune's Children" is an enormously fun read. Arthur Vanderbilt relates how his ancestors accumulated and then depleted an almost unimaginable fortune. In the process they created a lot of majestic homes and even more miserable people.
It all starts with the Commodore, a poorly-educated miser with a mean-streak and a wild side. It ends with the battle over baby Gloria, whose genes prepared her for the jeans that brought the family a fresh infusion of cash. In between, a variety of Vanderbilt spendthrifts and misanthropes. There's George, who built the largest private home ever constructed in the US -- Biltmore Estate. By the time he was done, he was out of money, and his heirs couldn't afford to live there. There's Consuelo, bullied into marrying a Duke by a mother with royal-mania. And there's Reggie, a gin-soaked playboy whose greatest accomplishment was looking good in a tux. Oh, the humanity.
The author spends a little too much time on the supporting cast, including Ward McAllister and Mrs. Stuyvesant Fish. They're interesting but take the focus away from the main characters. He also fails to flesh-out a number of family members, including Alfred, who inherited the bulk of the fortune but had the misfortune of booking passage on the Lusitania.
Photos and a family-tree help you keep straight who's who, and all in all, this portrait of the people who personified the best and worst of "The Gilded Age" is most worthwhile. And, more proof that money can buy comfort, but not happiness.
Rating: 5
Summary: All you wanted to know about the Vanderbilts-and more!
Comment: What can I say? This book is truly fabulous. Even if you are not interested in the Vanderbilt family, you must read this book! It just shows how truth is stranger than fiction. The cast of characters in this book includes: Cornelius Vanderbilt, his son William Henry, the famous Alva Vanderbilt (who practically sells her daughter to an broke English lord for marriage) to Gloria Vanderbilt as a little child getting fought over. These are just some of the interesting people you will meeet in this book. I would give it ten stars, if I could!
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Title: The Vanderbilts by Jerry E. Patterson ISBN: 0810917483 Publisher: Harry N Abrams Pub. Date: 1989 List Price(USD): $55.00 |
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Title: The Vanderbilt Women: Dynasty of Wealth, Glamour and Tragedy by Clarice Stasz ISBN: 1583487271 Publisher: iUniverse.com Pub. Date: 2000 List Price(USD): $29.95 |
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Title: Families of Fortune: Life in the Gilded Age by Alexis Gregory, John Kenneth Galbraith ISBN: 0865651809 Publisher: Vendome Pr Pub. Date: 2001 List Price(USD): $35.00 |
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Title: First Four Hundred : New York and the Gilded Age by Jerry Patterson ISBN: 0847822850 Publisher: Rizzoli Pub. Date: 2000 List Price(USD): $40.00 |
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Title: The Glitter and the Gold by Consuelo Vanderbilt Balsan ISBN: 0704100029 Publisher: The Preservation Society of Newport County Pub. Date: 01 January, 1953 List Price(USD): $16.95 |
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