A Visit to the Biltmore Estate in North Carolina

04 July 2011

President Obama and his wife, Michelle, toured the Biltmore Estate in April 2010

FAITH LAPIDUS: Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA in VOA Special English. This week, Rich Kleinfeldt and Shirley Griffith are your guides as we take you to the Biltmore Estate. This huge home was built more than a century ago near the mountains of North Carolina.

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SHIRLEY GRIFFITH: An estate is a property, usually large, owned by one person or a family. The man who owned the Biltmore estate in North Carolina was George Vanderbilt.

He was born in eighteen sixty-two and died in nineteen fourteen. His father and grandfather were two of the richest and most powerful businessmen in America. They made their money in shipping and railroads.

The Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina, has added a winery, hotel, restaurants, shops and an online collection of home and garden products

When his father died, George Vanderbilt received millions of dollars. He chose to spend a good deal of that money building his home in North Carolina. More than one thousand people began the work on it in eighteen eighty-nine.

The structure was ready six years later in December eighteen ninety-five. Biltmore is now open to the public. It is well worth a visit. So, close your eyes and imagine you are going there.

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