Chasing Chance: Stories of the Peirce--Prince Families in America

An enthralling study of a founding American dynasty –the Peirces and the Princes--in an interwoven story of family heritage that extends from the earliest settlements to the mid-twentieth century. From Pilgrims to Robber Barons, martyred witches to Confederate officers, artists to statesmen, founders of towns, states, and industries, from journalists to pirates, or pioneers to war heroes, each person in the narrative has an individual destiny and a distinct story. Yet each individual character occupies a place and a moment in the larger story of the United States, was shaped by and helped to shape that moment in time. Each person is linked to the others in a kind of golden braid of DNA and family heritage that extends from the earliest settlements to the present. Chasing Chance is richly illustrated with one hundred images, portraits, and photographs drawn from Prince family archives and museums and historical societies elsewhere. In addition, each chapter includes “mini-genealogies” which focus specifically on the characters in that chapter and their relationship to one another and the modern family. AUTHOR: Eileen Warburton is a New England writer and teacher. Among many published works on places and people, she is the author of the award-winning In Living Memory: A Chronicle of Newport Rhode Island, 1888-1988 (1988) and of the notable biography, John Fowles: A Life in Two Worlds (2005). SELLING POINTS: . A quintessential American tale. . Award-winning author Eileen Warburton's previous books include the best-selling biography, John Fowles: A Life in Two Worlds (2005). . Intriguing story follows family members as they founded cities and towns, opened new states, and became farmers, physicians, judges, and titans of industry. . Highlights include the exciting story of the Prince family in the "Gilded Age", of the wealthiest, luckiest man in New England, his magnificent business triumphs, his lifelong love affair, and the tragic death of his brilliant aviator son in World War I. . Helpful “mini-genealogy” focuses specifically on the characters in each chapter. 100 colour illustrations

Table of Contents:
Foreword; Introduction; Acknowledgments; I The Great Puritan Migration: 1 To Be a Pilgrim: The Old Comers of Plymouth; Plantation and Salem; 2 1634: The Princes and the Peirces Come to America; 3 Colonial Ancestors in Rhode Island: Roger Williams, the Quaker Cousinage, and the Line to George H. Norman; II The Coastal Empire; 4 The Peirce-Nichols Family: The Shipmasters of Eighteenth-Century Salem; III Early Nineteenth Century Boston: America's Cultural and Educational Capital 5 Chester Harding: Art from America's Frontier; 6 The Peirces of Cambridge, Massachusetts: Professor Benjamin Peirce, Sarah Hunt Mills, and the Charmed Circle of Function Grove; An Era Ends, An Era Begins

About the Author :
Eileen Warburton is a New England writer and teacher. Among many published works on places and people, she is the author of the award-winning In Living Memory: A Chronicle of Newport Rhode Island, 1888-1988 (1988) and of the notable biography, John Fowles: A Life in Two Worlds (2005).