Elizabeth Drexel Lehr

The "shocking secret" promised by the cover of this book is that "King Lehr," the toast of Gilded Age society, the wit of Newport, the debonair dresser of the chic set, was gay. And not just any kind of gay, but bitchy queen gay. And not just bitchy queen gay, but the the kind of bitchy queen gay who would marry poor sweet innocent Elizabeth Drexel for her money and social status, without revealing his sexual orientation until their wedding night.

And then they are all Roman Catholics, and Elizabeth can't get a divorce because the shock and scandal would kill, absolutely KILL, her poor sick ailing mother. . . who nonetheless manages to hold on for what have been at least twenty years.

I purchased this book it while visiting Newport, and almost certainly would not have read it otherwise. But I enjoyed it, and felt it complemented my visit nicely. In spite of "King Lehr"'s rather unreliable narrator, the book is a fun and gossipy account of Newport Society when it was in all its trashy, nouveau riche, haute American vulgar glory of the 1870s to the 1910s.… (mehr)