An Elegant Wilderness: Camping in High Style

March 21, 2011 - PRLog -- "An Elegant Wilderness, Great Camps and Grand Lodges of the Adirondacks, 1855-1935," by Gladys Montgomery recounts the story of the private retreats of the Gilded age industrial rich who travelled north from New York City to hunt, fish, play and teach their children lessons from the great outdoors. Transported in private Pullman cars, they arrived with chefs from the city’s premier restaurants, a retinue of servants, tennis and singing coaches, chauffeurs and secretaries, and cadres of famous guests.

On the shores of the region’s shimmering lakes, in high style rustic cabins with dozens of bedrooms, two storey fireplaces, icehouses and boathouses, railroad tycoon Collis P. Huntington, mining magnate Daniel Guggenheim, financiers J. Pierpont Morgan and Otto Kahn,  New York governor Levi Morton, Teddy Roosevelt, and philosopher William James relaxed, networked, and philosophized.  Powerful, brilliant and wealthy women camp owners included Lucy Carnegie, Margaret Emerson (Vanderbilt), and Marjorie Merriweather Post.

Published by Acanthus Press in collaboration with The Adirondack Museum, "An Elegant Wilderness" combines architectural, cultural history and biography, illustrated with archival black-and-white photographs of mansion cabins and their eccentric, lavish interiors, boating trips, fishing contests, and  parties, many published for the first time.

For more on this new look at a remarkable era in American social history, see http://www.acanthuspress.com/ps-67-4-an-elegant-wildernes...

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Acanthus Press publishes books at the intersection of material culture and architectural history. Our award-winning books chronicle the lost histories of houses and objects, of clients and designers. More information www.acanthuspress.com