A diverting but unsurprising new history of the Astor clan
Mention “Astor” to most people and you immediately conjure up tales of fabulous wealth, the sort of Gilded Age beauty and excess expressed to perfection in the paintings of John Singer Sargent. The family name became synonymous at times with luxury and good taste, at others with greed, power and extreme snobbishness. The founder of the dynasty, John Jacob Astor, was a German immigrant and one-time fur trader who came to America in 1783 after the Revolutionary War. His descendants swiftly capitalized on his substantial achievements, creating a Manhattan property empire of unrivaled wealth. There was also plenty of Astor philanthropy and involvement in political and cultural life along the way but then, in the early twenty-first century, came a fall from grace as dramatic as the rise.
