Overview

"Elizabeth Sinkler Coxe's Tales from the Grand Tour, 1890-1910 is a travelogue of captivating adventures through exotic lands as experienced by an intrepid American aristocrat and her son at the dawn of the twentieth century. A member of the prominent Sinkler family of Charleston and Philadelphia, Elizabeth """"Lizzie"""" Sinkler married into Philadelphia's wealthy Coxe family in 1870. Widowed just three years later, she dedicated herself to a lifelong pursuit of philanthropy, intellectual endeavor, and extensive travel. Heeding the call of their adventuresome spirits, Lizzie and her son Eckley set sail in 1890 on a series of odysseys from the United States to Cairo, Luxor, Khartoum, Algiers, Istanbul, Naples, Vichy, and Athens. Like many of their peers in the upper echelons of American society, this wealthy duo were drawn into the Egyptian craze that swept late-nineteenth-century society, and they fully immersed themselves in the nascent field of scientific archaeology. More obsessed and philanthropic than most, the Coxes not only visited the sites and monuments of ancient civilizations but also participated in digs, funded entire expeditions, and subsidized the creation of the Coxe Wing of Ancient History at the University of Pennsylvania Museum. A prolific correspondent, Lizzie conscientiously recorded her adventures abroad in lively prose that captures the surreal exhilarations and harsh realities of traversing the known and barely known worlds of Africa and the Middle East. Her letters and recollections are complemented by numerous photographs and several original watercolor paintings. By words and pictures, Lizzie Coxe's """"Tales from the Grand Tour"""" reveal the turn-of-the-century excitement about the burgeoning field of Egyptology, the intellectual pursuits available to women of means, and the familial and social ties between the upper classes of the North and South, that predated and survived the Civil War."

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9781570036330

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Reviews

Sharing the story of a woman who was comfortable in the North and the South and embraced a larger world as well, Elizabeth Sinkler Coxe's Tales from the Grand Tour broadens our understanding of the complexities of the postbellum United States. Journal of Southern History The sketches and written accounts of her extensive travels possess considerable period charm. Lizzie Sinkler seems promising raw material for one of her cousin-in-law Edith Wharton's novels. Charleston (S.C.) Mercury The letters make for terrific armchair-and-ottoman reading, superb in their evocation of time. . . . To bridge the gaps in the letter-writing chronology, LeClercq contributes a highly readable narrative that pulls the reader along like a good novel. Charleston (S.C.) Post & Courier Through both words and pictures, this vivid chronicle of camels and trains, dervishes and pyramids, demonstrates the grand tour's cultural importance. Charleston (S.C.) Magazine A fascinating travelogue detailing the turn-of-the-twentieth-century adventures of intrepid traveler and socialite Elizabeth Sinkler Coxe . . . that included trips to Egypt, Turkey, France, Italy, and Greece. Drawing on Lizzie's diary, travel journals, letters, and business documents, great-grandniece LeClercq provides an exotic firsthand account of a unique type of upper-class travel in a bygone era. Booklist

Sharing the story of a woman who was comfortable in the North and the South and embraced a larger world as well, Elizabeth Sinkler Coxe's Tales from the Grand Tour broadens our understanding of the complexities of the postbellum United States. Journal of Southern History The letters make for terrific armchair-and-ottoman reading, superb in their evocation of time. . . . To bridge the gaps in the letter-writing chronology, LeClercq contributes a highly readable narrative that pulls the reader along like a good novel. Charleston (S.C.) Post & Courier The sketches and written accounts of her extensive travels possess considerable period charm. Lizzie Sinkler seems promising raw material for one of her cousin-in-law Edith Wharton's novels. Charleston (S.C.) Mercury Through both words and pictures, this vivid chronicle of camels and trains, dervishes and pyramids, demonstrates the grand tour's cultural importance. Charleston (S.C.) Magazine A fascinating travelogue detailing the turn-of-the-twentieth-century adventures of intrepid traveler and socialite Elizabeth Sinkler Coxe . . . that included trips to Egypt, Turkey, France, Italy, and Greece. Drawing on Lizzie's diary, travel journals, letters, and business documents, great-grandniece LeClercq provides an exotic firsthand account of a unique type of upper-class travel in a bygone era. Booklist

Sharing the story of a woman who was comfortable in the North and the South and embraced a larger world as well, Elizabeth Sinkler Coxe's Tales from the Grand Tour broadens our understanding of the complexities of the postbellum United States. Journal of Southern History Through both words and pictures, this vivid chronicle of camels and trains, dervishes and pyramids, demonstrates the grand tour's cultural importance. Charleston (S.C.) Magazine The sketches and written accounts of her extensive travels possess considerable period charm. Lizzie Sinkler seems promising raw material for one of her cousin-in-law Edith Wharton's novels. Charleston (S.C.) Mercury The letters make for terrific armchair-and-ottoman reading, superb in their evocation of time. . . . To bridge the gaps in the letter-writing chronology, LeClercq contributes a highly readable narrative that pulls the reader along like a good novel. Charleston (S.C.) Post & Courier A fascinating travelogue detailing the turn-of-the-twentieth-century adventures of intrepid traveler and socialite Elizabeth Sinkler Coxe . . . that included trips to Egypt, Turkey, France, Italy, and Greece. Drawing on Lizzie's diary, travel journals, letters, and business documents, great-grandniece LeClercq provides an exotic firsthand account of a unique type of upper-class travel in a bygone era. Booklist

Author Information

A native of Charleston, Anne Sinkler Whaley LeClercq is director of the Daniel Library at the Citadel and a great-great-great-granddaughter of Emily Wharton Sinkler. She holds a master's degree in librarianship from Emory University and a J.D. from the University of Tennessee. LeClercq is also editor of Between North and South: The Letters of Emily Wharton Sinkler, 1842-1865 (USCP ISBN 1-57003-412-5).

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