The Washingtons. The role played by the descendents of the family of George Washington in the life and work of F. Scott Fitzgerald

Among the mourners at the funeral of Scott’s grandmother, Cecilia Aston Scott Fitzgerald, in 1924 were the Forrest family, a distinguished Washington family whose ancestral home in Georgetown Cecilia had stayed at during her early years in the capital. The head of the Forrest family was well-known government attorney Randolph Keith Forrest, the nephew of…

J.G. ROBIN — The Incredible Rise and Fall of the Ukrainian Gatsby

The scholar Thomas P. Riggio was among the first to explore the similarities between Theodore Dreiser’s Mr X in Twelve Men and Fitzgerald’s titular hero, Jay Gatsby, but few if any have explored Robin’s life in any real detail. This mini-book takes a look at the life and times of the sky-rocket millionaire from his…

The Usual ‘Unusual’ Suspects

“I was immediately struck by the number of young Englishmen dotted about; all well dressed, all looking a little hungry, and all talking in low, earnest voices to solid and prosperous Americans.” The Great Gatsby I’d like to go back to another Max Gerlach conundrum. On Max’s 1942 World War II Draft Registration Card, Gerlach…

Designs on Gatsby: Max Gerlach, Francis Cugat and F. Scott Fitzgerald.

Max von Gerlach, an associate of author F. Scott Fitzgerald, made regular trips to Havana. At one time, Havana was also the home of Francis Cugat, the Spanish-Cuban artist who designed the famous dust-jacket for Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel, The Great Gatsby. Here we explore the remarkable life of Cugat and the very faintest possibility that…