Episode #27: Let's Talk About the Gilded Age

Oops!  Jennifer forgot the show was called Circa SUNDAY Night,  and posted this week's episode on Monday.   But, we'll forgive her this time because tonight's show is all about the Gilded Age in New York, and as this episode of Circa Sunday Night goes up, a new episode of the HBO drama The Gilded Age is airing as well.  Wait...could this have been part of her brilliant plan all along?  We'll never know.  But what we can say is that tonight's show is weird.  One minute we're talking about Downton Abby, the next we're talking about the Vanderbilts, and somewhere in between we're taking a stroll down memory lane with Jennifer as she recounts key moments from high school at her old hometown's soon-to-be-demolished shopping mall.  On second thought, it's not so weird; it's just another romp around Circa 19xx Land.  Once we leave Jennifer's childhood mall we'll make our way to a sparkling 19th Century dinner party, meet the Mrs. Astor, and learn about the fine art of ormolu.  It's all in a night's work.  Won't you come along?

Hey, did you know that Jennifer's on YouTube now?  Please visit her channel and subscribe.  She's desperate.
Circa 19xx Land on YouTube

Show Links
Really beautiful and awesome books for this episode:
The Gilded Age in New York by Esther Crain
A Season of Splendor: The Court of Mrs. Astor in Gilded Age New York by Greg King
When the Astors Owned New York by Justin Kaplan
The Gilded Age: Overture to the American Century by Alan Axelrod

Article
Examples of Ormolu:  The Mayfair Gallery
Article about Ormolu: The Mayfair Gallery Blog

Urban Explorer Video about White Lakes Mall that Upset Jennifer
Look for the Orange Julius Canopy!

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Transcript

We have to talk about the Gilded Age—the HBO show and the era.  We have to.  That just has to happen.  So let’s get into this.

For our cold open this week I want you to close your eyes and, with your imagination, travel with me to an amazing costume ball.  

The date:  Monday, March 26th, 1883

Our hostess?  Alva Vanderbilt.  Dying to make a splash and break into the upper eschelon of Gilded Age New York society, she held the most spectacular and extravagant costume ball anyone had ever seen.  Invitations went out to 1300 guests, who would enjoy a sumptuous dinner and the music of not one—but TWO—orchestras.  And the setting—the stuff of pure fantasy.  Thousands of orchids and roses costing somewhere in the neighborhood of $11,000 (which would be around $300,000 in 2022) filled the glittering rooms at the Vanderbilt’s  new chateaux.  

Details of the party had been leaked to the press, so everyone in town seemed to know about it.  A crowd—held in check by police—began to form in the early evening.  It wasn’t until 8:30 that the crowd had something to watch.  Footmen in powdered wigs and 18th-century style knee breeches and silk stockings rolled out a maroon carpet with gold edging all the way from the front door—under an awning—to the street.  It wasn’t until 10:00 that the magic of the evening started to happen and a long line of carriages began to pull up with the Vanderbilts’ guests.  And—wow.  They were each wearing the most sumptuous costumes depicting historical figures, characters from books and operas, queens and fairies, kings and Greek gods, toreadors and gypsies.  All in satin and velvet, and endless diamonds.

As they entered, trumpeters positioned at the top of the grand staircase played a fanfare to announce everyone’s as they made their way to the great dining room.  Everywhere there were palm fronds, ferns, orchids, roses, bougainvillea—all laced with delicate electric lights.   The party began with quadrilles. (What’s a quadrille, you ask?  Well, I didn’t know either.  I went out to Youtube to watch a few.  They look like square dances, only not the super fast square dances with someone calling dance steps.  From what I can tell a quadrille contains four couples that do these choreographed spins and twirls and steps together.  Honestly, I think it looks like so much fun.  Are there still quadrille dances?  I don’t know, but if I was invited to one I would totally go).  Anyway, later, at 2:00 in the morning, an 8-course supper was served among the floral fantasy.  Two artificial fountains provided a backdrop while guests dined.  At the center of the room was huge palm tree that reached the ceiling. 

The guests danced literally until dawn; they began to depart at 6:00 in the morning.

The Vanderbilt’s knew how to throw a party—and had the deep pockets needed to fund it.  This evening cost them approximately what would have been $6,000,000 in our day.

*

Wow, this sounds like the ball of the century, right?  Yeah, well, turns out, it wasn’t.  There was an even more ostentatious ball a few years later in 1879.  Thrown by Cornelia and Bradley Martin, and known as the “Bradley-Martin Ball,” that one was so over-the-top extravagant that it drew fire from newspapers and clergymen as being hedonistic and a sign of the elite’s obliviousness of the needs of the poor.

This, my friends, is the Gilded Age, and we’re going to get into in tonight’s show.  I adapted that description of the famous Vanderbilt costume ball of 1883 from a wonderful book, A Season of Splendor by Greg King.  Ah, but there is so much more to cover, so…on we go.  

[Theme Song]

Greetings, everyone.  I hope you’ve had a pleasant couple of weeks.  This episode is going out into the world late.  Yeah, I’ve been sick and haven’t been able to record.  If you’re new here, this is my latest excuse.  There’s always something.  Somehow I always run out of time.  But here we are!  Together again at last!

Hey, if you ARE new, welcome.  I’m Jennifer Passariello, and I’m your cruise director as we journey to parts both known and unknown on the timeline of the early 20th Century.  Hey, how do you like that?  I just made that little spiel up on the spot.  I’ve always wanted to be a cruise director just like Julie on the Love Boat.  Does anyone remember the Love Boat?  That was a thing at one time. And what is it about ship references here on Circa Sunday Night?  Lately we spent some time on the Queen Mary for our Halloween episode, and then last time we sailed aboard the ill-fated Prinzessin Victorial Luise.   I have another ship show in my head that might make it into this season.  So, we sail the seven seas in this show.

[Music interlude]

Anyway, thanks so much for stopping by tonight.  If you would do me a great favor and subscribe to my Youtube channel, I would be so thrilled.  My channel is brand new, only a couple weeks old, and there’s almost nothing on there, but I’m hoping to grow it and eventually put out a variety of content there.  Let’s see what’s happening out there right now……………I have one subscriber!  Oh, thank you, subscriber!  I think it’s my mom.  I don’t know how to see who the subscribers are.  Anyway, if you would go out there and subscribe, wow, would I be honored.  I’ll put a link to the channel in the show notes.  If Youtube is not your thing, don’t worry, you can still listen to Circa Sunday Night in all the usual podcast directors.  If you would give this show a five-star review on your preferred platform, that would help me out a bunch.

There, I got that bit about the subscriptions and the ratings done.  I always hate that part.

Moving on…I’ve been watching the Gilded Age on HBO, that’s the new show brought to us by Julian Fellowes—you remember him—he’s the one that created Downton Abby.  Incidentally, he’s written some books that I enjoyed thoroughly.  If you are looking for some fun reads, I really liked his book Belgravia, which was set in an era that’s a little early for me—the early 1800s—as you know, I gravitate toward the early 1900s), but still a fun read.  He wrote Snobs, and Past Imperfect as well.  All of these books—while set in different eras—involve the wealthy class.  For those of us NOT in that class, it’s fun to peer into that world.  But back to Downton Abby:  The next film in that series is coming out IN APRIL!  That’s only weeks away.  Will we be talking about that on Circa Sunday Night.  Uh….YES.  That one is called Downton Abby: A New Era.  Can’t wait for that one.

Ok, so I have a lot to say about the Gilded Age show, and I also want us to explore the era a bit.  But before we do that.  Will you indulge me a few minutes and let me talk about a personal matter?  This might be extremely boring, so if you want to skip ahead, you can do that.  But there’s something that’s come up from my own past that’s made me a little sad, and it’s been on my mind, so I want to talk about it. 

[Song]

I found out this week that an old dilapidated shopping mall—the White Lakes Mall in Topeka, Kansas where I spent just about every Saturday when I was in high school—is being torn down.  I’m actually kind of surprised by my reaction to this bit of news.  It’s stirred up some melancholia and old memories I haven’t thought about in years.  

White Lakes has been abandoned and in terrible shape for many years—and I myself haven’t been in town for a long, long time, so I haven’t even been by the mall in ages—nor have I thought about the mall in decades.  But in the back of my mind, I always knew it was still standing—it still existed.  Soon it won’t exist at all except in my memories—which are already pretty dim.  

I grew up in Topeka, and when I was in high school, White Lakes Mall was the place we all went every weekend.  It was the place where, as a 15-year-old, I applied for my first real jobs.  I remember getting all dressed up and going from store to store with my empty little resume in hand, asking for job applications.  I didn’t end up getting my first job there;  but I did get the best first job any teenager could have had—a job at Richman Gordman’s Department store, which was, incidentally, just down the street from White Lakes.  It no longer exists, either.

Anyway, when I wasn’t in school or working at Richman Gordman’s, I was at the White Lakes Mall with my friends.  I remember this wonderful little jewelry store, “The Hatbox,” where I got my ears pierced…twice, and where I bought my first pair of earrings.  I spent hours and hours playing Ms. Pakman at the Alladin’s Castle arcade.  I got my first credit card at the JC Penney’s at White Lakes right after I got my job at Richman Gordman’s because I had heard it was a good way to start establishing a credit history.  White Lakes was the setting for the Local Jerry Lewis telethons for years.  And, in my senior year of high school, my speech class participated in a “window on the classroom” program the school district cooked up which involved setting up a classroom in the middle of the mall.  We were bussed in each day for an hour, and shoppers could stop and watch us being students as they made their way to the Hallmark store or the Town Crier bookshop or the Foxmore boutique.  It felt just as weird then as it sounds now.

Walgreens used to have a store there—with an awesome restaurant.  You could sit in a booth and watch the shoppers go by.  One time when I was really small, my mom and I went there and had grilled cheese sandwiches.  I only vaguely remember the sandwiches, but I remember my glass of water well; it had a fly floating in it.

When I was in high school one of our favorite places to eat was the Orange Julius food stand.  We would get California dogs, which were essentially hotdogs smothered in chilli and American cheese.  And, of course, we would get Orange Julius—those creamy orange juice drinks that I think you can still get somewhere, although it’s been a lifetime since I’ve had one.

And that Orange Julius stand is what brings on the melancholia when I think about White Lakes coming down.  The other day I saw a Youtube video with this young guy walking through the old ruins of White Lakes Mall.  Not only has its roof partially caved in, but an arsonist did a number on it a few months ago, so you just see a lot of rubble and charred remains everywhere.  There is only one recognizable feature of the Mall that I knew left:  The canopy of the Orange Julius stand.  The sign is long gone, but the canopy remains in the middle of all that rubble.  The guy in the video didn’t know what that canopy was.  I mean, how could he know?  But I knew.  That where my friends and I would eat California dogs and try to get the attention of the cute boys from school who were also hanging out there.

Time marches on.  I guess this is how you know you’re getting old—when you start telling stories that know one else could possibly find interesting about places that only you care about.  

Anyway, I’m going to put a link in the show notes to the White Lakes video in case you have any curiosity about this at all.

Well, now that I’ve lost about 2/3s of my audience, how about if we dive into the Gilded Age?

[Music]

Who here has been watching the Gilded Age on HBO?  Raise your hands.  When I learned about this show, I knew I had to check it out.  

New episodes air every Monday night, and as I’m recording this, tomorrow night will be Episode 4.  If you haven’t watched this yet, and you think you might want to, it’s not too late; it’ll be easy to catch up.  

A couple of things to note:  In many ways, this show feels a LOT like Downton Abbey.  We’ve got the downstairs characters and the society characters—so there is drama both upstairs and downstairs.  We have spectacular sets—I mean spectacular.  Heavens, those sets are beautiful.  We have gorgeous gowns—and—there is a spectacular ballroom.  We’ve only gotten a glimpse of a ballroom so far, but even that glimpse is just dreamy.  (If you’ve been around here for a while you know how I love a great ballroom).

One other thing to note, though, is that this is HBO, not PBS.  For those of you listening from outside of the United States, PBS is our Public Broadcasting System, and that’s were Downton Abbey originally aired for us.  Downton aired first in the U.K., and then the U.S.  I don’t actually know if The Gilded Age is airing in the U.K.  But anyway, HBO is a premium streaming service with a gigantic budget.  I don’t like HBO.  It’s edgy, and they have no qualms about explicit sexual situations and violence.  I don’t like edginess.  In my old age I really try to protect my brain from that stuff.  People are often so careful about the healthy foods they put in their bodies, and yet they don’t think twice about putting toxic things in their heads.  Honestly, I didn’t use to either—but I do now.  The only reason I even have HBO is because it comes free with my Internet service.  If I had to pay extra for it, I wouldn’t subscribe.  But anyway, as a result, Gilded Age feels a bit darker than Downton.  If it goes too far, I’ll stop watching.  But, the characters are really fascinating, and, as I mentioned, the visuals are stunning—so, HBO, don’t let me down!

What I thought we would do tonight is get familiar with the Gilded Age ERA, and then dive into the show.  So, you know the drill:  Let’s load up the time machine…[sound]…and we are going to dial up the year 1882, because that’s when the show begins.  

[Music]

Well, what’s this?  We seem to be at a dinner party—and let’s be honest, we’re completely under-dressed.  It’s a good thing these guests can’t see us.  But we can’t miss THEM.  They sparkle like stars in the sky.  The people are acting strangely—at least by today’s standards.  I’m not sure what’s going on here, but it seems that we are watching a very choreographed ritual.  I’m going to consult a fabulous book on the Gilded Age, this is one of the books I read in preparation for this episode, entitled A Season of Splendor by Greg King.  Maybe he can straighten us out.  Here’s how he describe the dinner party of Gilded Age Society:

Dinner guests usually arrived 30 minutes before a meal. Liveried grooms waited at the curb opening carriage or motor car doors and assisting guests out of their vehicles and up the steps, where another groom bowed as they entered. Here, footmen attired in their frilled shirts, brocaded coats, knee breaches, silk stockings, and patent leather shoes directed them to cloak rooms. Ladies deposited their furs, wraps, and muffs wild gentlemen handed over their coats, hats, scarves, and white gloves. These guests were always uniformly attired: ladies in formal evening gowns, long gloves, and an abundance of jewelry, and gentlemen in white tie and tails. In the cloakroom, gentlemen were motioned to a damask draped table, whereas silver tray held a selection of boutonnieres provided by the Hostess. A second tray held small white envelopes, each inscribed with a gentleman's name; within he would find a gilt edged card with the name of the lady he was to escort in to Jenner the gentleman had no say in such alliances, which were all arranged in advance by the Hostess in accordance with her seating plan. The Hostess waited to greet each guest personally before they passed into the drawing room, the Butler loudly announcing each name at their approach. Here a welcoming fire might burn, adding to the luster of the shimmering crystal chandeliers and sconces that caught the sparkling diamonds of the ladies toilets and sent prisms of light dancing across gilded chairs. 

Enormous arrangements of roses, orchids, and lilacs sprouted from priceless Chinese vases, adding their scent to the hickory logs on the hearth and, occasionally, a whiff of incense that lingered from a sensor swung through the rooms a few moments before the guests arrived.

In some houses a footman might offer guests and apertif from a silver tray often a small Sherry although in the age before the arrival of the cocktail this act smacked a bad taste. 

After 15 or 20 minutes, the Butler appeared and announced,  “Madam, dinner is served.” The Hostess rose and offered her arm to the most important male guest. The gentlemen sought out the ladies named on their cards and led them in procession to the dining room.  

According to etiquette, the Hostess always entered the dining room last. One large, long table was preferred for dinners with fewer than 50 guests; only above this number were a number of smaller, round tables used. 

The table was draped with felt, most often red but occasionally green, followed by a fine white damask cloth from Ireland or France. This was often exquisitely embroidered with floral garlands, cartouches sewn with the owner's monogram, and open scrolls through which the Crimson could peak; the top of the white cloth might be further embellished with a runner of Crimson velvet, sewn with foliot designs in goldthread and adorned with colorful Peacock feathers. Napkins generally match the white damask of the tablecloth, but at the turn of the century, napkins embroidered with monograms and fringed with gold lace became fashionable. Roses, Violet, carnations, orchids, and lilacs were used for decoration. One might find a central silver basket of roses rising three or four feet, the base worked with carefully arranged tendrils of Ivy that spread across the table, or a vase of tall lilies and palm fronds add intervals down the table were smaller mixed arrangements of lavishly cascading roses, orchids, lilies, and Ivy. Occasionally a Hostess might offer an additional, unexpected arrangement, such as a canopy of roses and lilies woven with Ivy, palm fronds, ferns, and boughs of Evergreen suspended from the ceiling and sat with tiny electric lights shimmering above the diners to “reproduce the sense of dreamland.”  

Every object on a table was carefully placed for maximum effect. Tall, gilded Candelabra stood at intervals, the flames of their wax candles shielded by white or light pink silk shades; they alternated with silver bowls of pineapple, or sugared fruits big decked with leaves and trailing vines.

laying the table normally took several hours the Butler worked with white gloved footman, carefully measuring each piece placed with a small rod to ensure uniformity. A usual place setting or cover, as it was known, included ten pieces of silver: on the right side was an oyster fork placed atop the soup spoon, a bread knife, a fish knife, a meat knife, and a salad knife; to the left was a fish fork with curved tines to flake the fish, a meat fork, a salad fork with widely spaced tines to avoid bruising the lettuce, and a fruit fork. When each course was completed, the footman would remove the use silver with the plate.  additional pieces of silver not already laid would accompany their respective courses, placed on either side of the new plate. Often these services, were works of art themselves composed of silver or ormolu their ornately scrolled handles decorated with family crests and the initials of the owners.

At the center of each plate was a damask napkin, folded three times to form a small pyramid holding a dinner roll; as second napkin would be brought with the dessert course. Directly above the plate was a hand lettered place card with the guest name, flanked by individual silver sellers of salt and pepper, and a small silver dish of salted nuts. Yes also found a handwritten menu; often these were written in French on gilt edged vellum cards. It was customary to provide some small favor for each attendee, set out at his or her place at the table; these were generally painted ribbons, fans, Card cases, type pins, or little jeweled eggs, although by the turn of the century it was common for hostesses to lavish engraved silver cigarette cases, gold cufflinks, and jewelry upon their guests. If crystal finger bowls were used, they were placed atop lace doilies with Violet or rose petals floated on the surface

Rarely encompassing fewer than eight courses and sometimes extending to 12 or 14, although we understood guests were in no way expected to partake everything offered. 

Conversation was lively but, following the standards of the day, focused on superficial matters: houses, travel, horses, music, and especially gossip.

coffee, sparkling water, and liquors signaled the end of the meal. At the conclusion, the hostess generally rose and retired to the drawing room with her female guests to engage in 1/2 hour of conversation over coffee or tea; the gentleman either remained at the table to smoke, drink port or Brandy, and discuss business, or retired to the library to do so occasionally, some entertainment might follow —a piano recital, a choral group to entertain, or for the more adventurous, perhaps a group of gypsy dancers or fortune tellers. The goal was to provide suitable diversion from the need for continued conversation. Within an hour after the meal had ended, dear guess generally began to look for signals that would allow their leave without any insult to their Hostess. Once a general lol had settled over the gathering, a keen Hostess would rise from her chair and fixed smile that no one could mistake as an invitation to linger, thank her guests for the pleasure of their company. The evening would then come to an end.

What a different world this is from the one we know.  So, who were these people?  Well, these are the society people in New York during the Gilded Age, which was a period of unprecedented—and largely untaxed—wealth.  This was the era of the Astors, the Vanderbilts, the Rockefellers, the Carnegies, and the Morgans.  It was also the era—and the social circle of Edith Wharton, who wrote about it in her books.  Where did all this money come from?  Well, the country was still new, and it was just emerging from the tumultuous and devastating Civil War.  Wealth came from steel, railroads, oil.  Investments and banking was a source of wealth, too.  Spanning from around the 1870s to 1910 or so, it overlapped the Victorian and Edwardian eras in the U.K. and the Belle Epoch in France and other European countries.

So, where did the name “Gilded Age” come from?  Surprisingly enough, from Shakespeare—by way of Mark Twain.

Listen to this.  This is from Shakespeare’s play, The Life and Death of King John:

To be possess'd with double pomp,

To guard a title that was rich before,

To gild refined gold, to paint the lily,

To throw a perfume on the violet,

To smooth the ice, or add another hue unto the rainbow, 

or with taper-light, to seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish,

Is wasteful and ridiculous excess.

Have you ever heard the phrase “gilding the lilly?”  That saying speaks to redundant beautification and excess.  The lilly is already beautiful—it doesn’t need gilding, right?  But it turns out, the Shakespearian source doesn’t say “gilding the lilly.”  It says “paint the lilly,” and “gild refined gold,” but it all gets to the same point.  

Well, that little passage is a source from which Mark Twain, and his one-time collaborator, Charles Dudley Warner, drew the title for their 1873 novel The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today.

Several decades after its publication, the era in which the novel was written—from the 1870s to the early 1900s—came to be called “The Gilded Age.”  This was a time of unprecedented wealth of a very tiny group of people.  Twain and Warner’s book satirized this period as an era of serious problems beneath a thin veneer of gold.  Among the very wealthy there was tremendous waste, and greed, and preoccupation with social standing.  Everything in their world looked beautiful on the surface—and, oh, my, it WAS beautiful.  But below the surface…well…that’s the stuff someone like Julian Fellowes might turn into a show.  And, of course he did.

Gilded Age society moved about in a few different settings:  New York was something of a home base—which makes sense, right, because that was the center of commerce.  But where else did these folks go?  Europe—England, France, and Germany were particularly popular destinations.  But here in this country, they went to the Berkshires and of course, Newport, Rhode Island.  Hey, guess who’s going to Newport this summer?  This girl!  Yes, I had actually booked a trip last year, but canceled to go to Florida instead.  But I have re-booked and am all ready to head to the Breakers, and Roseclift, and any other Gilded Age mansion I can manage to tour.  I’m not going to talk about Newport in tonight’s show because I’m sure I’ll have much more to say about that in a future episode.

But now let’s talk about the people associated with the Gilded Age.  I listed some of the families—The Carnegies, the Morgans, etc. a moment ago.  There are many others, as well.  But there are two people in particular that I want to focus on tonight:  Caroline Astor and Alva Vanderbilt.

Before we meet these two ladies, let’s take a little detour for a brief lesson in ormolu.

In my research on the Gilded Age, this is a term that kept coming up.  Now this wasn’t exactly a new term for me.  I knew ormolu as a type of gold-metal decoration on old furniture, vases, light fixtures or candelabra, clocks, and even walls.  These gold ornamental pieces are often intricate, featuring floral swags, flourishes, cherubs, and sometimes architectural motifs. Ormolu pieces are beautiful—and I run into it from time to time in antique stores.  But what I have always thought of as gold-COLORed metal, is—generally real gold.  At least real ormolu is gold.  It’s actually gilt bronze.  So bronze is the base metal, and it has a thin skin of gold applied to it.  The gold is typically 18 or 24 karat.  Now, the work “ormolu” refers to both the technique for gilding the bronze as well as the end product:  gilt bronze.

Bronze is a less expensive metal than gold, but, of course, our friends in the Gilded Age loved the “Look” of gold, so ormolu was a reasonable alternative.  Don’t think, though, that ormolu was inexpensive.  No chance.  It was made by skilled craftsman through a slow, painstaking process.  And, of course, we are talking about gold.

But the gilding process itself could be dangerous.  Here’s a description of the process from mayfairgallery.com:

The most common method for gilding bronze in the 18th and 19th centuries was what’s known as “mercury gilding” or “fire gilding.”  It’s actually an ancient technique dating as far back as the 3rd Century B.C.  It involved applying a solution of mercuric nitrate to the bronze, followed by a mixture of mercury and ground gold powder known as an amalgam.

The bronze was then heated so that the mercury, which had a lower boiling point, evaporated, leaving behind the gold powder which was fused onto the surface of the bronze.  This method was extremely dangerous, due to the harmful mercury fumes produced by the process. Gilders often didn’t survive past the age of 40.

France—the center of most ormolu production in the 19th century—actually outlawed the use of mercury in 1830 because of the danger involved.  And yet, the law was so badly enforced that mercury gilding remained the main method of creating ormolu well into the 20th Century.

Nowadays, the process of gilding bronze involves a complicated electrochemical procedure known as electroplating, or gold plating.  This was a method which was developed mid-way through the 19th Century, but was not used widely until the 20th.

­­­Most of the Gilded Age mansions in New York are no longer standing, but one of the most famous of the era isn’t in New York at all, but in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina—yes, that’s right, the Biltmore, which remains the largest home in America.  I visited the Biltmore a couple of years ago, and yes, I do remember seeing many examples of ormolu there.  Ormolu is emblematic of the age.  And now we know all about it.  We’re here to learn, aren’t we?

And now…let’s meet Caroline Astor.

Caroline Astor—THE Mrs. Astor—was the wife of William Backhouse Astor, Jr.  Her own family could trace their wealth back to the Dutch New York aristocracy at the time of the city’s founding.  Her husband was wealthy, too, but she actually had a better pedigree than he did.  She represented OLD Money.  This is important, because early in the Gilded Age that really mattered.  Mrs. Astor wanted to establish a non-titled American Aristocracy (non-titled meaning we had nothing like Dukes and Duchesses or Counts and Countesses, or Princes and Princesses—and whatever other titles are common in Europe).  So, no titles, but the Old Money elites were the closest thing to royalty American had.

Mrs. Astor had five children—one of whom, her son, John Jacob “Jack” Astor IV, died on the Titanic.  Sidebar:  what a sad story that was.  He was the richest man in the world when he died at the age of 47.  He was sailing aboard the Titanic with his pregnant wife.  He loaded her on a lifeboat, and asked if he could escort her because of her delicate condition, but all spaces were reserved for women and children.  So, he loaded her on the life boat, assured her the sea was calm and that he would see her in the morning.  He was last seen alive smoking a cigarette with the writer Jaques Futrelle.  Astor’s body was recovered on April 22, and he was identified by the initials sewn on the label of his jacket.

Anyway, when Mrs. Astor was raising her family, they were her primary focus.  It was after those first decades that she turned her attention to reigning over Gilded Age society.  And this creepy side-kick of hers, Ward McAllister, helped her ascend to the very top.

This is from Wikipedia:

In the decades following the Civil War the population of New York City grew exponentially, and immigrants and wealthy new arrivals from the Midwest began challenging the dominance of the old New York Establishment. Aided by the social arbiter Ward McAllister, Mrs. Astor attempted to codify proper behavior and etiquette, as well as determine who was “acceptable,” for inclusion in her social circle and who was not. They were the champions of old money and tradition.

McAllister once stated that, amongst the vastly rich families of Gilded Age New York, there were only 400 people who could be counted as members of Fashionable Society. He did not, as is commonly written, arrive at this number based on the limitations of Mrs. Astor's New York City ballroom—oh, good to know.  That’s what I’d always heard.  Her husband's lack of interest in the social whirl did not stop but instead fueled her burgeoning social activities, which increased in intensity as her children grew older.

Mrs. Astor was the foremost authority on the "Aristocracy" of New York in the late nineteenth century. She held ornate and elaborate parties for herself and other members of the elite New York socialite crowd. None was permitted to attend these gatherings without an official calling card from her. Mrs. Astor’s social groups were dominated by strong-willed "aristocratic" females. These social gatherings were dependent on overly conspicuous luxury and publicity. More so than the gatherings themselves, importance was highly placed upon the group as the upper-crust of New York's elite.

There is a lot more to her story.  But what I find most fascinating about her is the degree of power and influence she was able to establish—somewhat later in her married life.  I saw an interview with Julian Fellowes in which he talked about Mrs. Astor, and he said that she was unattractive (she was), and that he couldn’t find any description of her as being witty or charming or a good conversationalist.  All she had was money—but there were many others who were staggeringly rich, too, and yet she’s the one that held unbelievable sway.  What a mystery.

And then we have her rival…Alva Vanderbilt.  

Alva was the wife of William Kissem Vanderbilt, who made his money in railroads. The Vanderbilts represented NEW money; they MADE their money, as opposed to inheriting it.  They didn’t have the pedigree that the Astors had, and so Alva’s early attempts to break into New York society were thwarted.  She couldn’t gain acceptance into the 400.  Alva was driven, and a hard woman.  The Vanderbilts were extraordinarily wealthy—even by Gilded Age standards.  You might remember our opening tonight when I described that over-the-top costume ball?  Well, Alva deliberately left Caroline Astor’s daughter Carrie off the guest list.  This was a shrewd move on Alva’s part, which forced Mrs. Astor to pay a visit to the Vanderbilts—clearly opening the door for their entrée into society.  Alva reciprocated by invited Carrie and Mrs. Astor to the ball.  Part of the lore of this moment in time is that Mrs. Astor said, “We have no right to exclude those whom this great country has brought forward.  The time has come for the Vanderbilts.”

[Let’s go slumming…]

Ok, so now let’s talk about the show, The Gilded Age on HBO.  Apparently Julian Fellowes had been playing around with the idea of this show for several years before it actually hit the air.  It’s original conception was as a prequel to Downton Abby.  If you recall, in Downton, Cora Crawley was an American—she was what came to be known as a “Dollar Princess,” a wealthy American who married into British aristocracy to bring her fortune to a dwindling estate in exchange for a fancy aristocratic title.  She would have been a young girl in the 1880s, which is when The Gilded Age show takes place.  Wouldn’t that have been a fascinating premise?  Alas, the Gilded Age didn’t evolve in that direction.

Instead, it features two principle families:  The Van Ryhnes, two aging sisters—one a widow and the other a spinster representing old money, and The Russells, who have built a spectacular mansion across the street.  They represent new money.  The Russels are inspired by the Vanderbilts.  I’m not sure if the Van Ryhnes are based on any real historical figures.  Mrs. Astor is a character in the show, and already we can see that Mrs. Russell (again, think “Mrs. Vanderbilt,” is having a hard time breaking into Mrs. Astor’s circle.  The main story lines involved these two families.  There are also some true historical events that are referenced.  The ladies on the show discuss the new Opera House that is being built;  The new Opera was built by new money families because those families were not permitted boxes at the existing Opera House.  That really happened.  

One of the things that was so amazing about Downton Abby is the setting of Highclere Castle—a real place.  The set of the Gilded Age are soundstages built to look like Gilded Age mansions.  Most of those old mansions are gone now, but as beautiful as those sets are, some of the magic is lost when you come to find out that the sets are just that—sets built for the show.

One of the other things that Guilded Age has working against it is the vast scope of the society that’s featured.  In Downton, are primary concern was a single family—the Crawleys—and their staff.  In Gilded Age, remember we have the potential for at least 400 characters to weave in and out of the story—not to mention other characters that are in that elite group.  Will this show be able to effectively manage it all?  

One thing that both Downton Abby and Gilded Age have in common is that both series examine a time of change.  In Downton, the change involved the crumbling of old estates and the shrinking of house staff after WWI.  In the Gilded Age there is a coming clash of new and old money, but in a larger sense, the various shifts that came after the end of the Civil War.

I read a review of The Gilded Age in the New York Times that was less than flattering.  The critic thought the dialogue was inconsistent and the character development somewhat lacking.  I have to say, though, that I really liked the first couple of episodes.  I already shared with you some of my concerns.  Keep it clean, HBO, or I’m out.

I’m going to leave the Gilded Age right there for now.  I’ll be turning back to it this summer when I go explore those magical Newport Mansions!  

Can it really be time for another work week?  Yeah, but it’s OK.  Friday will be here before we know it.  By for now, and I’ll see you soon.