Blood Relations

London: Hutchinson & Co (Publishers) Ltd An imprint of the Hutchinson Publishing Group, 1980. BOOK: Previous Owner Markings (Personal Library Name Stamp to Front Free Endpaper); Spine Bumped; Light Shelf Rub to Boards; Edges Lightly Soiled. DUST JACKET: Lightly Creased; Lightly Chipped; In Archival Quality Jacket Cover. SUB-TITLE: The Rise & Fall of the du Ponts of Delaware. CONTENTS: Genealogical Tables; Prologue; Part One The Family; Part Two The Cousins; Part Three The New Regime; Part Four Coup d'Etat; Part Five All in the Family; Part Six The End of an Epoch. SYNOPSIS: When Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald went to live in Wilmington in 1927, Scott wrote to his editor that "there is a kind of feudalism... The du Ponts, an immense family, mostly female, dominate the town." In fact, by the 1920s the du Ponts had more money than any other single family, including the Rockefellers, the Mellons or the Guggenheims, but unlike these others, they kept quiet about it. Ever since the original Pierre Samuel du Pont arrived on American shores in January 1800, the family as a whole had been making strenuous and largely successful efforts to avoid the kind of publicity that surrounded the rise of other great American clans. The saga of the du Ponts is, however, full of every kind of human and social drama, and, now, it is finally being told in all its fullness and rich detail by the masterful biographer of Dulles, Lindbergh and Hirohito. There is practically nothing in human experience--with the possible exception of actual poverty--that hasn't happened to the du Ponts. Their story encompasses insanity, cruelty, malevolence and murder--but also great genius. In business they have often behaved like the worst exploiters, even encouraged wars to their own monetary advantage; but they are also responsible for remarkable discoveries which have benefited the peaceful occupations of mankind. Almost from the moment they landed, the du Ponts began to produce a breed of quintessential Americans, fired by the challenges of a new nation and prepared to fight for their share of its power and success. Their mills on the banks of the Brandywine River produced $1,000,000 in profit from gunpowder sold to the North in the Civil War; without Du Pont powder the United States would not have been able to fight, much less win, the Spanish American War; and in World War I the British bought explosives from Du Pont. By the 1920s, however, the company had already branched out into a wide range of chemical products, precursors of what was, in 1939, to be the most explosive Du Pont invention of all time--nylon. In 1922, the family gained control of General Motors and thereby created what the Sherman antitrust suit brought by the government in 1950 was to call "the largest singe concentration of power in the United States." For a long time the du Ponts virtually controlled the state of Delaware: they collected the tolls on the turnpike, they operated what schools existed, they manipulated state and local government, they had a member of the family in the United States Senate. And their personal power was to last until the 9160s when, for the first time, there was no du Pont at the helm of what had been one of the largest family-owned-and-operated businesses in the world. There are still as many du Ponts in Delaware, and they are still as rich, but their separation from the family enterprise seems somehow to have diminished their influence, power and importance. For well over 150 years, however, the gripping stories of this extraordinary family and its monolithic business were dramatically and inextricably intertwined. Leonard Mosley has been given access to all of the du Pont letters and papers never before available to any biographer. He has brought to Blood Relations all the persuasive powers of a veteran reporter and researcher combined with a prodigious writing talent, to produce a book that is revealing, incisive, and, above all, engrossing. Born in Manchester, Leonard Mosley has been a foreign correspondent most of his working life. As chief war correspondent for the Sunday Times during World War II he reported the Battle of Britain, the Middle East campaign, and the Allied landings in Greece and Italy. The author of nineteen books of history and biography and vie novels, Mr Mosley has also worked as a theatre and film critic in London and as a scriptwriter in Hollywood. He now lives on Sanibel Island, in Florida, where he is at work on his next book.. First Edition 1st Printing. Hard Cover. Very Good/Very Good. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.