The House the Rockefellers Built: A Tale of Money, Taste, and Power in Twentieth-Century America

By Lee Baldwin Dalzell and Robert F. Dalzell Jr.

Book Overview

"The Dalzells . . . do an astonishing job of placing Kykuit in historical context while weaving the larger-than-life Rockefeller personalities into its very walls and hallways."--Los Angeles Times

One hundred years ago America's richest man established a dynastic seat, the granite-clad Kykuit, high above the Hudson River. John D. Rockefeller, who detested ostentation, had something simple in mind--at least until his son John Jr. and his charming wife, Abby, injected classical taste and a spirit of noblesse oblige into the equation. Built to honor the senior Rockefeller, the house would also become the place above all others that anchored the family's memories and sense of itself.

With memorable skill and insight, the authors take us inside the house and the family to observe how each new generation, often sharply at odds with one another, left its distinctive mark on the place.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0805088571
• ISBN13: 9780805088571
• Release Date: August 2008
• Publisher: Holt Paperbacks
• Length: 352 Pages
• Weight: 1.24 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.1" x 8.9"

Customer Reviews

ROCKEFELLER'S KYKUIT

This is a very well written book about the iconic Rockefellers and their family estate. It's interesting how the house seems to act as a metaphor for each of the family member's, their interests, their desires. Kykuit is an amazing set peice and the mixture of Jr.'s Bosworth and Ogden Codman classical estate, Sr's wanting the house to be tasteful and not too grand, and Nelson's avande garde, modern tastes. The estate and it's location are breathtaking and the Codman interiors are exquisite. This is a very well researched and fascinating study of the Rockefellers and their Kykuit. I do recommend getting the Rockefeller Family Home: Kykuit, it's very good.

Excellent Insights into and the history of the family and house

Lee and Robert Dalzell have put together a very fascinating look at both the history of the home that generations the Rockefeller family occupied, how they built it, wrestled over it, disagreed about it and loved it which reflected the complicated relationships of the dynasty. Not unlike many parent and sibling relationships, there were arguments about what their parents' intentions were, Senior's and Junior's, Abby's, etc. and how they lived their lives based on interpretations of their parental affinities. The home (house?) becomes the symbol of the old world of privilege as well as a modern world of the current generation. The house and now the entire estate essentially was cobbled together and pulled apart as each new generation left its own footprints. I particularly enjoyed trying to separate Lee's from Robert's "story" as well as the intertwining story of the house and the family.

The House The Rockefellers Built

This is much more than a book on the building of a house. It is about three generations of a family, their individual personalities, their character and development over time, all centered around the construction of a house that became a national monument. It is about their time and place in history. It is well written, a delight to read and leaves the reader yearning to know about the succeeding generation. Bob McGill

Rockerfellers House

I read this book from an architect's viewpoint, and it squares with my experience that there is something about homebuilding that is intensely personal. Much has been written about visionary Designers. In fact, it is the clients who hire and steer those designers who are writing their world views large. I visited Kykuit once and thought the design was quirky for a pile from the mansion age...quirky but with vim & vigor, bold but not bombastic. Now I know how it got to be that way.