Is it possible that Brooke Astor, the patron saint of New York City charitable giving, was a snob? The prosecution and its first two upper crust witnesses -- Lord William Astor, Brooke's British cousin by marriage, and Linda Gillies, the former director of the defunct Vincent Astor Foundation -- have gone to great pains to paint Mrs. Astor as an aristocrat with the common touch. When she visited the Metropolitan Museum she didn't only hang out with Philippe de Montebello, its director, or her fellow members on its high powered board; she also hobnobbed with the security guards. On visits to the Bronx Zoo, which named a baby elephant after her -- "Astor" -- she was just as interested in the worker who shoveled out his enclosure as she was in the head of the zoo. But when it came to...
- 4/30/2009
- by Ralph Gardner Jr.
- Huffington Post
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