A well-behaved woman

Alva Smith her southern family destitute after the Civil War married into one of America's great Gilded Age dynasties: the newly wealthy but socially shunned Vanderbilts. Ignored by New York's old-money circles and determined to win respect she designed and built 9 mansions hosted grand balls and arranged for her daughter to marry a duke. But Alva also defied convention for women of her time asserting power within her marriage and becoming a leader in the women's suffrage movement.