To say that Sam Aldrich has had an unusual and interesting life would be a serious understatement. Born into a life of wealth and privilege, Aldrich was expected to follow his father into a career of high finance. But Aldrich had other ideas, as these lively memoirs make clear. At the age of 25, he danced in London with Queen Elizabeth II. At 37, he was marching with Martin Luther King in Selma, Alabama. Recounting the journey between and beyond those two points, and musing over the irony of the contrast they represent, is the subject of this memoir.

Aldrich is the grandson of Nelson W. Aldrich, United States Senator from Rhode Island, and has fond memories of when the Rhode Island Historical Society headquarters on Benevolent Street in Providence was the Aldrich family home. Aldrich has a long history of public service to the city and state of New York, having served as a deputy police commissioner in New York City, director of the New York State Division for Youth, executive assistant to Governor Nelson Rockefeller, president of the Brooklyn Center of Long Island University, and commissioner of the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation. He has taught commercial law, public policy, and urban and environmental studies at Skidmore College, the University at Albany­–SUNY, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and SUNY Empire State College’s Center for Distance Learning. He lives in Saratoga Springs.

R.S.V.P. to Caitlin Murphy, 401-331-8575 x28 or cmurphy@rihs.org.