The Captains and the Kings by Edith Benham Helm is a richly textured portrait of America's transformation from the Gilded Age into the modern world, seen through the lives of those who led and those who served. Helm, who spent decades as a White House social secretary and close observer of Washington's elite, draws back the curtain on the interplay of politics, power, and personality that defined an era. With elegance and insider knowledge, she explores how ambition and idealism c...