World-famous as "the Queen of Spas," Saratoga Springs entered a golden age in the Victorian years and the world flocked to its doorstep every summer. The rich and famous rubbed elbows with a growing post-Civil War middle class popularizing a new concept—the summer vacation. They came ostensibly to "take the waters" at the bubbling mineral springs, but what they really came for was to see and be seen on the grand piazzas of the magnificent hotels that lined Saratoga's Broadway and to share the limelight at glittering balls and fabulous parties.
The grace and opulence of America's Victorian era faded with the dawn of the twentieth century, and almost all of the buildings and views in this book have long since disappeared—felled by the wrecker's ball or spectacular, cataclysmic fires—but now, in Saratoga Lost, the reader can take a guided tour of that grand era and view over 200 historic photographs from the author's extraordinary private collection, complemented by period artwork.
