John Jacob Astor IV IV was born on July 13, 1864 at his parents' country estate Ferncliff in Rhinebeck, New York. He was the youngest of five children and only son of businessman, collector, and race horse breeder/owner William Backhouse Astor, Jr. and socialite Caroline Webster "Lina" Schermerhorn. His four elder sisters were Emily, Helen, Charlotte, and Caroline ("Carrie"). He was a great-grandson of fur-trader John Jacob Astor and Sarah Cox Todd, whose fortune made the Astor family one of the wealthiest in the United States. Astor's paternal grandfather William Backhouse Astor, Sr. was a prominent real estate businessman. Through his paternal grandmother, Margaret
Vincent Astor Vincent Astor William Vincent Astor (November 15, 1891 – February 3, 1959) was a businessman, philanthropist, and member of the prominent Astor family. Called Vincent, he was born in New York City on November 15, 1891. He was the son of John Jacob Astor IV, millionaire and inventor and his first wife, Ava Lowle Willing, an heiress from Philadelphia. He graduated from St. George's School, in Middletown, Rhode Island, in 1910 and attended Harvard University from 1911 to 1912, leaving school without graduating. Like his father, Astor belonged to the New York Society of Colonial Wars. He served as commodore