More than a statue: Cooper explores the Vanderbilt legacy

When Anderson Cooper was 6, his father took him to see the statue of Cornelius “The Commodore” Vanderbilt near New York’s Grand Central Terminal. The transportation magnate was America’s richest man when he died in 1877, the 19th century equivalent of Jeff Bezos or Bill Gates.

He was also Cooper’s great-great-great grandfather.

For much of his life, the CNN personality shunned his lineage. Now 54 and a father himself, Cooper has taken a second look and, with historian Katherine Howe, written the book “Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty” that explores the family’s complicated legacy.

The Commodore was obsessed with making money, and left behind $100 million — real coin back in those days. Yet