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The Spinach King: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty
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About This Book
The riveting saga of the Seabrooks of New Jersey, by one of the New Yorker's most acclaimed storytellers. "Having left this material for his writer son, my father must have wanted the story told, even if he couldn't bear to tell it himself. So begins the multigenerational story of a forgotten American dynasty, a farming family from the bean fields of southern New Jersey that became as wealthy, glamorous, and powerful as Gilded Age aristocrats. The autocratic patriarch, C. F. Seabrook, was hailed as the "Henry Ford of agriculture." His son Jack, a keen businessman, was poised to take over what Life called "the biggest vegetable factory on earth." But the carefully cultivated facade—glamorous outings by horse-drawn carriage, hidden cellars of world-class wine, and movie stars skinny-dipping in the pool—hid dark secrets that led to the implosion of the family business. In a compulsively readable story of class and privilege, betrayal and revenge, John Seabrook explores his complicated family legacy and dark corners of the American Dream.
Reviews
"Makes for juicy (if at times gossipy) reading—who doesn't enjoy seeing a house of cards fall?"
"Though excessive in some details, this lucidly written family history provides a unique lens through which to view changes in food production and distribution in the United States."
"It makes for a unique and enthralling family saga."
"It's a shocking but juicy story, one he tells by harnessing his gift for quietly observing details that lesser writers would miss and then deploying them with the energy of a man who has skin in the game ..."
"But its real business is the peculiar blood sport called filial love."
"Offers a critical account of labor conditions faced by the company's thousands of worker-tenants ..."
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