Search results
Plot Summary. Denise Kiernan’s The Last Castle: The Epic Story of Love, Loss, and American Royalty in the Nation’s Largest Home (2017) is the true story of the Gilded Age mansion Biltmore House, the largest and most grand residence ever constructed in the United States.
People also ask
Is the last castle a true story?
What is the story of the last castle about?
What is the theme of the last castle?
Is the last castle a good book?
Sep 26, 2017 · The Last Castle is an epic story about Biltmore House envisioned and built by George Cornelius Vanderbilt, the grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt, during the Gilded Age with the history of Biltmore Estate then spanning the Jazz Age, the Depression and two World Wars.
- (12.1K)
- Hardcover
The story of Biltmore spans World Wars, the Jazz Age, the Depression, and generations of the famous Vanderbilt family, and features a captivating cast of real-life characters including F. Scott Fitzgerald, Thomas Wolfe, Teddy Roosevelt, John Singer Sargent, James Whistler, Henry James, and Edith Wharton.
- Paperback
- May 01, 2018
Dec 16, 2020 · The Last Castle: The Epic Story of Love, Loss, and American Royalty in the Nation's Largest Home by Denise Kiernan. Published by Atria Books. Publication date: September 26, 2017. Genres: History, Non-fiction. Bookshop, Amazon.
- Who Is Denise Kiernan?
- How Did George Washington Vanderbilt Get The Fortune to Build The Biltmore?
- George Made Some Wise Choices
- The Biltmore Continued to Evolve
- Edith's Role in Biltmore's Legacy
- The Biltmore Estate Today
- Comments
I recommended The Last Castle to our book club because I had read Kiernan's previous book The Girls of Atomic Cityand had enjoyed the story of their contributions to creating the fuel for the Manhattan Project bomb in secrecy in the Tennessee Hills. Most times before I read a non-fiction book, I go online to see what other materials the author has ...
The family patriarch, Cornelius Vanderbilt, grew up on a farm in New York and saved enough money to buy a "ramshackle boat" for $100 to ferry people from Staten Island to Manhattan. The one-boat business grew into several ferry boats, then steamships and then railroads. George's father William was one of Cornelius's sons and since William had prove...
Once his idea of Biltmore was formulated, George began systematically purchasing the parcels of land around the area where the home was to be built. He selected Robert Morris Hunt for the architect whose grand-scale projects were already well known. He also had selected Frederick Law Olmisted who had developed some impressive city parks, including ...
When the Vanderbilts moved into the Biltmore, the house was far from finished and the landscaping was just beginning to take root. After the birth of Cornelia, Edith began an Arts & Crafts workshop to help the townspeople develop skills to boost their income. They continued to support schools and charities in Ashville and undertook the building of ...
After George passed, Edith became even more determined to safeguard George's legacy. George's will was very detailed on how his estate would be divided and how the properties would be managed, but the Biltmore and farm was becoming a liability, so Edith began selling off the forest surrounding their home and new income tax laws were being put into ...
After a rather wild period, Cordelia re-married twice. In her last marriage, Cordelia was 72 and her groom was 46, which would have caused some gossip, but like her mother Edith and her father George she continued to share the Vanderbilt fortune. In the epilogue in the book, the reader discovers a number of facts about the Biltmore today including ...
mactaverson April 23, 2020: You are quite right. Consuelo Vanderbilt 1877-1964 born in New York, did marry the 9th Duke of Marlborough during the Gilded Age for social position and his money. After Consuelo parted from him and remarried, she still maintained ties with Winston and the Churchill family. I found that she wrote a bio called The Glitter...
Oct 6, 2017 · As an American castle, its hyperbolic magnificence still stands as a touchstone for grandeur imagined and grandeur lost. The Last Castle is contextually rich in social, political, and economic history of the late-19th and early-20th centuries.
Mar 17, 2020 · The Last Castle: The Epic Story of Love, Loss, and American Royalty in the Nation’s Largest Home by Denise Kiernan is about the Biltmore House in Asheville, NC, and the people involved with it. I wanted this book first of all because the Biltmore has been a favorite place to visit.
