the whole of Newport was alight with festivities. Harold’s cousin Neily and Neily’s wife, Grace, were hosting a party at their home, Beaulieu, and would give a dinner the following night. Harold’s brother, William K. Vanderbilt II, had arrived in town on his motor yacht, named the Alva for their mother, to watch the festivities. Goelets, Astors, Delanos, and even President Franklin D. Roosevelt himself thronged the parties. The entirety of the American elite in the fields of wealth and government was spending the week in Newport to watch Harold Vanderbilt defend the Auld Mug, as they called
...more
