Between 1870 and 1914, at the height of America’s Gilded Age, no less than 454 heiresses exchanged their crisp, new American dollars, for musty, old European titles. Aside from the new lease of life now afforded to the previously cash-strapped aristocrats, the first task was to restore their crumbling, ancestral piles - many of which today are counted among the UK’s best-loved national treasures. But just who was taking advantage of who? This lecture explores some of the more prominent of those stately homes that owe their existence entirely to their fairy-dollar godmothers, and reveals the unfailingly astonishing stories of how the dollars were made; why and how the couples were matched; and, how the money was spent on the often overlooked legacies of these transatlantic trailblazers.