Long Island's Gold Coast, more than any other section of the country, has captured the imagination of America. This, in part, is attributable to F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby.
This revised and updated two-volume analysis of the North Shore families documents over 1,700 estate owners in a modified "Who's Who" format. Included are 1,394 photographs of the estates, biographical data on the estate owners and their families, locations of estates using current street references and village designations, estate names, acreage, architects, architectural styles, dates of construction, landscape architects, subsequent owners, location of archival photographs of the estates, and information as to whether mansions are still extant and, if not, the dates of demolition. Included are family cross-references to the other four volumes in the series.
The appendices list estate names, village locations of estates, as well as, architectural and landscape commissions. The civic activity and occupation appendices document the contribution of Long Islanders, including statesmen, intelligence agents, financiers, writers, and inventors. Maiden names, rehabilitative secondary uses of estates including golf courses which were formerly private estates, motion pictures filmed at estate sites, a general bibliography of the "Gilded Age," and a bibliography specific to individual estate owners, with the location of personal papers, have also been included.
Author Biography:
Judith and Raymond Spinzia are former Long Island residents, now residing in central Pennsylvania. Their first book, Long Island: A Guide to New York's Suffolk and Nassau Counties (New York: Hippocrene Books, 1988; 1991 revised; 2009 revised), is a standard reference book which has been used as a textbook for teaching Long Island history and can be found in almost all public libraries and schools on Long Island. The Spinzias write and speak, jointly and separately, on a variety of Long Island-related subjects including the North and South Shore estates, Tiffany stained-glass windows, and the Vanderbilts of Long Island. On several occasions their lectures were chosen by the former radio station of The New York Times, WQXR, as the cultural event of the day in the New York Metropolitan area. Additionally, they have been featured on local television and radio programs and in articles published by The New York Times, Newsday, and other regional newspapers. As Long Island history consultants for a local cable television channel, material from the Spinzias' guidebook was aired twice daily in an effort to encourage local interest. They also were consultants for a Japanese television network for a documentary on Louis Comfort Tiffany and contributed material to the Arts and Entertainment Network's "Biography" series for its presentations on the Vanderbilt and Tiffany families. Their companion volume to this North Shore work entitled Long Island's Prominent South Shore Familes: Their Estates and Their Country Homes in the Towns of Babylon and Islip was published in 2006. Two more books in the series were published in 2010, Long Island's Prominent Families in the Town of Hempstead: Their Estates and Their Country Homes and Long Island's Prominent Families in the Town of Southampton: Their Estates and Their Country Homes. The last in the series, Long Island's Prominent Families in the Town of East Hampton: Their Estates and Their Country Homes, is in preparation.
