author
John Dryden Kuser
Born into one of New Jersey’s most prominent families, he moved through politics, public life, and society columns with unusual intensity. His story also brushes against twentieth-century American high society through his early marriage to Brooke Astor.
1 Audiobook
Haiti: Its dawn of progress after years in a night of revolution
by John Dryden Kuser
About the author
John Dryden Kuser, often known as Dryden Kuser, was born on September 24, 1897, and died on March 3, 1964. He was a New Jersey politician from the influential Kuser and Dryden families, the grandson of Senator and Prudential founder John Fairfield Dryden.
He began his political career young, winning election as a Bernardsville councilman in 1922. He later served in the New Jersey General Assembly and then in the New Jersey Senate, building a public career that kept his name well known in the state.
Beyond politics, Kuser is often remembered for his place in a prominent American family network and for being the first husband of Brooke Astor. That mix of public office, wealth, and personal notoriety has kept him a recurring figure in accounts of New Jersey history and old American society.