John Jacob Astor IV

John Jacob Astor IV was born on July 13, 1864, at his parents' country estate of Ferncliff in Rhinebeck, New York. He was the youngest of five children and only son of William Backhouse Astor Jr., a businessman, collector, and racehorse breeder/owner, and Caroline Webster "Lina" Schermerhorn, a socialite. His four elder sisters were Emily, Helen, Charlotte, and Caroline ("Carrie").

On February 17, 1891, Astor married socialite Ava Lowle Willing, a daughter of Edward Shippen Willing and Alice Barton. The couple had two children:

From 1894 to 1896, he was a colonel on the military staff of New York Governor Levi P. Morton. Shortly after the outbreak of the Spanish–American War in 1898, Astor personally financed a volunteer artillery unit known as the "Astor Battery", which served in the Philippines. In May 1898, Astor was appointed a lieutenant colonel in the U.S. Volunteers and served as an officer on the staff of Major General William Shafter in Cuba, during the Santiago Campaign. He was later given a brevet (war/temporary promotion) to colonel in recognition of his services. He was mustered out of the Volunteer Army in November 1898.

Like generations of Astors before him, he also made millions in real estate. In 1897, Astor built the Astoria Hotel, "the world's most luxurious hotel", in New York City, adjoining the Waldorf Hotel owned by Astor's cousin and rival, William. The complex became known as the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. The Waldorf-Astoria would later be the host location to the U.S. inquiries into the sinking of the RMS Titanic, on which Astor died.

Among Astor's accomplishments was A Journey in Other Worlds (1894), a science-fiction novel about life in the year 2000 on the planets Saturn and Jupiter. He also patented several inventions, including a bicycle brake in 1898, a "vibratory disintegrator" used to produce gas from peat moss, and a pneumatic road-improver, and he helped develop a turbine engine.

His father's Italianate mansion of 1864 was partly rebuilt in 1904 to designs by Stanford White of McKim, Mead & White. The house retained its conservative exterior, and a separate sports pavilion in the Louis XVI style was built. This was Stanford White's last project before he died.

Astor and Willing divorced in November 1909. Compounding the scandal of their divorce was Astor's announcement that he would remarry. At the age of 47, Astor married 18-year-old socialite Madeleine Talmage Force, the sister of real estate businesswoman and socialite Katherine Emmons Force. Their parents were William Hurlbut Force and Katherine Arvilla Talmage. Astor and Force were married in his mother's ballroom at Beechwood, the family's Newport, Rhode Island, mansion. There was also much controversy over their 29-year age difference. His son Vincent despised Force, yet he served as best man at his father's wedding. The couple took an extended honeymoon in Europe and Egypt to wait for the gossip to calm down. Among the few Americans who did not spurn him at this time was Margaret Brown, later fictionalized as The Unsinkable Molly Brown. She accompanied the Astors to Egypt and France. After receiving a call to return to the United States, Brown accompanied the couple back home aboard RMS Titanic.

Astor's fame has made him a frequent character in media, literary, and stage works, especially in stories about the Titanic. German actor Karl Schönböck played Astor in the 1943 Nazi propaganda film Titanic. William Johnstone played Astor in the 1953 film Titanic, and in the 1997 version of Titanic he was played by Eric Braeden. In the 1996 miniseries, he was played by Canadian-born actor Scott Hylands. Astor was also portrayed by David Janssen in the 1979 film S.O.S. Titanic. Perennially, in the town of Astoria, Oregon (so named for Astor's patrilineal great-grandfather), he is portrayed by a local amateur actor in street corner vignettes. He was played by Miles Richardson in the 2012 Titanic miniseries. Astor was portrayed by his great-grandson Gregory Todd Astor in an April 2012 production of Titanic: The Musical. Astor also makes a brief character appearance in a late episode of The Alienist, a limited TNT/Netflix series (2018) based on the novel by Caleb Carr. The scene shows a pre-Titanic 'Jack Astor' greeting a principal character at an 1896 staging of Mozart's opera Don Giovanni.

The estate, reduced to 50 acres (200,000 m) and renamed "Astor Courts", eventually became a wedding venue. Chelsea Clinton had her wedding there on July 31, 2010.

Astor left $69 million of his $85 million estate (equivalent to approximately $1.75 billion in 2017 dollars) to Vincent. This value included his Ferncliff country estate in Rhinebeck, New York, and his yacht, the Noma.