When Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist Bill Dedman noticed in 2009 a grand home for sale, unoccupied for nearly sixty years, he stumbled through a surprising portal into American history. Empty Mansions is a rich mystery of wealth and loss, connecting the Gilded Age opulence of the nineteenth century with a twenty-first-century battle over a $300 million inheritance. At its heart is a reclusive … is a reclusive heiress named Huguette Clark, a woman so secretive that, at the time of her death at age 104, no new photograph of her had been seen in decades. Though she owned palatial homes in California, New York, and Connecticut, why had she lived for twenty years in a simple hospital room, despite being in excellent health? Why were her valuables being sold off? Was she in control of her fortune, or controlled by those managing her money?
Dedman has collaborated with Huguette Clark’s cousin, Paul Clark Newell, Jr., one of the few relatives to have frequent conversations with her. Dedman and Newell tell a fairy tale in reverse: the bright, talented daughter, born into a family of extreme wealth and privilege, who secrets herself away from the outside world.
Huguette was the daughter of self-made copper industrialist W. A. Clark, nearly as rich as Rockefeller in his day, a controversial senator, railroad builder, and founder of Las Vegas. She grew up in the largest house in New York City, a remarkable dwelling with 121 rooms for a family of four. She owned paintings by Degas and Renoir, a world-renowned Stradivarius violin, a vast collection of antique dolls. But wanting more than treasures, she devoted her wealth to buying gifts for friends and strangers alike, to quietly pursuing her own work as an artist, and to guarding the privacy she valued above all else.
The Clark family story spans nearly all of American history in three generations, from a log cabin in Pennsylvania to mining camps in the Montana gold rush, from backdoor politics in Washington to a distress call from an elegant Fifth Avenue apartment. The same Huguette who was touched by the terror attacks of 9/11 held a ticket nine decades earlier for a first-class stateroom on the second voyage of the Titanic.
Empty Mansions reveals a complex portrait of the mysterious Huguette and her intimate circle. We meet her extravagant father, her publicity-shy mother, her star-crossed sister, her French boyfriend, her nurse who received more than $30 million in gifts, and the relatives fighting to inherit Huguette’s copper fortune. Richly illustrated with more than seventy photographs, Empty Mansions is an enthralling story of an eccentric of the highest order, a last jewel of the Gilded Age who lived life on her own terms.
Advance praise for Empty Mansions
“Empty Mansions is a dazzlement and a wonder. Bill Dedman and Paul Newell unravel a great character, Huguette Clark, a shy soul akin to Boo Radley in To Kill a Mockingbird—if Boo’s father had been as rich as Rockefeller. This is an enchanting journey into the mysteries of the mind, a true-to-life exploration of strangeness and delight.”—Pat Conroy, author of The Death of Santini: The Story of a Father and His Son
“Empty Mansions is at once an engrossing portrait of a forgotten American heiress and a fascinating meditation on the crosswinds of extreme wealth. Hugely entertaining and well researched, Empty Mansions is a fabulous read.”—Amanda Foreman, author of A World on Fire
From the Hardcover edition.
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Unexpectedly good. A fascinating look into the life of one of America’s lesser-known but highly influential early moguls.
I read this book quite some time ago, but it’s a story that left me thoughtful long after the last page. It offers a glimpse at an heir to a fortune and how she chose to live in privacy. Huguette Clark was an intriguing to me as Sarah Winchester or Marthe de Florian. It’s a book I could easily become immersed in again, and I love the cover!
Well written.
Intriguing and a bit sad.
An extremely reclusive heiress with all the money in the world passes at 104. Her will is contested by distant relatives and a nurse who may have been manipulating her. A portrait of a woman born to extreme wealth that essentially dropped from society. A fascinating story that is still unfolding. Well written and researched.
This is a tedious read. I didn’t find it compelling in the least and did not finish it.
This is a true story about the daughter of a wealthy man yet you would never know it based on the way she lived.
If you think that money can buy happiness, after reading Empty Mansions, you’ll know that it doesn’t.
The book is fascinating, even more so because it’s true. Hard to imagine having that much money and having all those mansions and not living in them. Sad to have such magnificent estates with no one living in them. Very interesting to read why the mansions were empty.
I found this true story fascinating !
Story about a very interesting lady, well-researched.
Well researched. Interesting until the end.
Loved this book. A period of history I knew little about and intriguing characters
Loved this book…hated for it to end.
This isn’t an attention-grabber, but it is interesting–history of American growth and development of wealth. Not really a 4, but better than a 3.
Never knew of this woman and this house. Fascinating read.
Failed to hold my attention
Fascinating account of the life of one of America’s richest and little known about families.
Enjoyed it. I love architecture and historical literature and so I found this book fascinating.
I did not finish the book. I was so disturbed at the actions of Einstein Hospital, the doctors and nurses obviously taking advantage of this woman and not treating g her obvious emotional/personality disorder in order to extort money.