The Harvard seminar that cost him a seventy‑million inheritance
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The Harvard seminar that cost him a seventy‑million inheritance
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The Harvard seminar that cost him a seventy‑million inheritance
In this episode, we trace Frederick Vanderbilt Field’s shift from heir to ideological actor and the choices that followed. We follow his Harvard years, a year at the London School of Economics, and the career decisions that put money, family expectations, and politics on a collision course - and ask what he thought he was building instead.
Person: Frederick Vanderbilt Field
Date: April 13, 1905 (birth)
Event: Endorsed Norman Thomas for president, 1928
Location: Harvard; London School of Economics; New York (Institute of Pacific Relations)
Topic: Loss of a promised seventy million dollar inheritance and political commitments
- Born a great-great-grandson of Cornelius Vanderbilt and groomed through Hotchkiss and Harvard into elite society.
- Spent a year at the London School of Economics studying under Harold Laski, which deeply altered his political convictions.
- Publicly endorsed Socialist Norman Thomas in 1928 and was cut off from the seventy million dollar inheritance by his great-uncle.
- Joined the Institute of Pacific Relations in 1929 as an unpaid assistant and used his family name and contacts to gain influence.
- Co-founded the journal Amerasia with Philip Jaffe in 1937 and later became executive secretary of the American Peace Mobilization in 1940.
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