Fortune’s Many Houses: A Victorian Visionary, a Noble Scottish Family, and a Lost Inheritance

Television producer Welfare explores in this colorful debut biography the glamorous, philanthropic lives of Scottish aristocrats John and Ishbel Gordon, who bankrolled numerous social causes in Britain and North America even as they bankrupted themselves through bad investments and extravagant building projects. Married in 1877, the Gordons’ honeymoon was a portent of things to come. Before the couple set out for Egypt, burglars stole Ishbel’s extensive jewelry collection; weeks later, she and John were setting up impromptu health clinics during a trip down the Nile River (they also took on the living and educational expenses of four former slave boys). During John’s tenure as the governor general of Canada from 1893 to 1898, Ishbel formed the Victorian Order of Nurses in Ottawa and initiated book drives to benefit rural areas. Both abroad and in Scotland, where they were the Marquess and Marchioness of Aberdeen, John and Ishbel designed, renovated, and built numerous stately homes; meanwhile, dodgy investments, including a series of North American ranches poorly managed by Ishbel’s brothers, further drained the couple’s resources. Welfare, who is married to the Gordons’ great-granddaughter, draws on an extensive collection of family papers to provide intriguing details about the couple’s social life and political causes. These imperfect do-gooders make for entertaining company. (Feb.)