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Alexandra Aldrich

Biography

Alexandra Aldrich

Alexandra Aldrich, a direct Astor descendant, lived at Rokeby, the house at the heart of her memoir, until the age of 14, when she left to attend boarding school. She later moved to Poland, where she studied violin and history, and then back to the United States, where she taught high school English and converted to Orthodox Judaism.

Alexandra Aldrich

Books by Alexandra Aldrich

The Astor Orphan: A Memoir
by Alexandra Aldrich - Nonfiction

Alexandra Aldrich, a direct descendant of John Jacob Astor, tells the story of her eccentric, fractured family; her 1980s childhood of bohemian neglect in the squalid attic of Rokeby, the family’s Hudson Valley Mansion; and her brave escape from the clan. Aldrich reaches back to the Gilded Age when the Astor legacy began to come undone, leaving the Aldrich branch of the family penniless and squabbling over what was left.