LENOX, Mass. — Author Elizabeth Winthrop Alsop, will tell the "an extraordinary and riveting true life story" at Ventfort Hall on Tuesday, July 9 at 4 pm. 

 

Local author and historian, Cornelia Brooke Gilder, will engage Elizabeth Winthrop Alsop in a conversational presentation. A tea will be served after the presentation.

 

According to a press release: 

 

As a child, Elizabeth Winthrop Alsop, along with her five brothers, was raised to revere the tribal legends of the Alsop and Roosevelt families. Her parents' marriage, lived in the spotlight of 1950s Washington where the author's father, journalist Stewart Alsop, grew increasingly famous, was not what either of her parents had imagined it would be. Her mother's strict Catholicism and her father's restless ambition collided to create a strangely muted and ominous world, one that mirrored the whispered conversations in the living room as the power brokers of Washington came and went through their side door. Through it all, her mother, trained to keep secrets as a decoding agent with MI5, said very little.

 

In this brave memoir, the author explores who her mother was, why alcohol played such an important role in her mother's life, and why her mother held herself apart from all her children, especially her only daughter. In the author's journey to understand her parents, particularly her mother, she comes to realize that the secrets parents keep are the ones that reverberate most powerfully in the lives of their children. Elizabeth Winthrop Alsop's memoir, Daughter of Spies: Wartime Secrets, Family Lies (Regal House, 2022) has been called "an extraordinary and riveting true life story" and a "unique, absorbing, and fascinating World War II era memoir."

 

As Elizabeth Winthrop, she has published over 60 works of fiction for readers of all ages. These include the award-winning fantasy series, "The Castle in the Attic" and "The Battle for the Castle" as well as the short story, "The Golden Darters," read on the nationwide radio program, "Selected Shorts," and included in "Best American Short Story anthology." She is the daughter of the journalist Stewart Alsop. You can find her online at www.elizabethwinthropalsop.com.

 

Tickets are $40 for members and with advance reservation; $45 day of; $22 for students 22 and under. Ticket pricing includes access to the mansion throughout the day of this event from 10 am to 4 pm. Reservations are strongly encouraged as seats are limited. Walk-ins accommodated as space allows. For reservations visit https://gildedage.org/pages/calendar or call us at (413) 637-3206. Note that all tickets are nonrefundable and non-exchangeable. The historical mansion is located at 104 Walker Street in Lenox.