What Would Mrs. Astor Do?
The Essential Guide to the Manners and Mores of the Gilded Age
by Cecelia Tichi
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Pub Date Nov 27 2018 | Archive Date Apr 03 2019
NYU Press | Washington Mews Books/NYU Press
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Description
A richly illustrated romp with America’s Gilded Age leisure class—and those angling to join it
Mark Twain called it the Gilded Age. Between 1870 and 1900, the United States’ population doubled, accompanied by an unparalleled industrial expansion, and an explosion of wealth unlike any the world had ever seen. America was the foremost nation of the world, and New York City was its beating heart. There, the richest and most influential—Thomas Edison, J. P. Morgan, Edith Wharton, the Vanderbilts, Andrew Carnegie, and more—became icons, whose comings and goings were breathlessly reported in the papers of Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst. It was a time of abundance, but also bitter rivalries, in work and play. The Old Money titans found themselves besieged by a vanguard of New Money interlopers eager to gain entrée into their world of formal balls, debutante parties, opera boxes, sailing regattas, and summer gatherings at Newport. Into this morass of money and desire stepped Caroline Astor.
Mrs. Astor, an Old Money heiress of the first order, became convinced that she was uniquely qualified to uphold the manners and mores of Gilded Age America. Wherever she went, Mrs. Astor made her judgments, dictating proper behavior and demeanor, men’s and women’s codes of dress, acceptable patterns of speech and movements of the body, and what and when to eat and drink. The ladies and gentlemen of high society took note. “What would Mrs. Astor do?” became the question every social climber sought to answer. And an invitation to her annual ball was a golden ticket into the ranks of New York’s upper crust. This work serves as a guide to manners as well as an insight to Mrs. Astor’s personal diary and address book, showing everything from the perfect table setting to the array of outfits the elite wore at the time. Channeling the queen of the Gilded Age herself, Cecelia Tichi paints a portrait of New York’s social elite, from the schools to which they sent their children, to their lavish mansions and even their reactions to the political and personal scandals of the day.
Ceceilia Tichi invites us on a beautifully illustrated tour of the Gilded Age, transporting readers to New York at its most fashionable. A colorful tapestry of fun facts and true tales, What Would Mrs. Astor Do? presents a vivid portrait of this remarkable time of social metamorphosis, starring Caroline Astor, the ultimate gatekeeper.
Available Editions
| EDITION | Other Format |
| ISBN | 9781479826858 |
| PRICE | $26.95 (USD) |
| PAGES | 352 |
Links
Featured Reviews
catherine h, Reviewer
Wow. What waste, what arrogance. Such bores! It's so pathetic that the world's wealthy never can think of better things to do with their money but promote their own silly interests and expect everyone else to aspire to be them! Money just wrecks the world. Read this for a good laugh. The absurdity and wastefulness is appalling. The ignorance and callousness sickens. Yeah, the Four Hundred were a sorry lot. it's a well researched book and contains lots in insight into the upper upper crust.
Deborah W, Reviewer
This book talked about upper class society in New York during the 1870 to 1900 period. The author provided brief biographies of the people who set the trends (like Mrs. Astor), quoted people who lived during that period talking about what it was like, quoted etiquette manuals as to proper behavior (for dining, funerals, etc.), and quoted magazine or newspaper articles talking about what the fashionable set wore or did. She also talked about how people reacted to new inventions, like electricity and telephones, or new trends, like eating lobsters or department stores.
Some of the topics covered were: fashionable house furnishing, lady's department stores, where men got their clothing, gentlemen's clubs, lady's clubs, dining out, hat styles, walking canes, cars, horseback riding, sports, bicycles, fashionable color combinations for clothing, what to wear for many different occasions, street etiquette, letter writing, calling cards, what the fashionable ate and drank, theaters, restaurants, Central Park, Newport, the Bowery, sailing, train travel, ocean liners, Wall Street, schools, views on divorce, and funerals.
Shari H, Reviewer
Caroline Schermerhorn Astor, wife of William Backhouse Astor, was the self appointed queen of the gilded age in America (approximately from 1870s to 1910). All of the new moneyed social climbers asked themselves "What would Mrs. Astor do?" to navigate the waters of "proper" behavior. Caroline, in order to maintain her status, freely gave her opinions on what to do and how to be. Shrinking violet, she was not.
The author, Cecelia Tichi, immerses the reader into the world of these newly rich New Yorkers and casts an amusing eye on the manners and peculiarities of their social realm. I have been hooked on the Titanic and Lusitania (yes, they sank in 1912 and 1916 but remnants of the Gilded Age remained) so this book has added more color to the world of the 19th century New York upper crust. It is amazing to read all of the ways people could succeed or really fall out of favor over 120 years ago. It is more amazing that some of the dos and don'ts survive to this day among the well shod classes.
Some of my friends who read this book were dismayed by the display of pettiness and shallow behaviour. I found this book to be delightful and an example of "making your own lot in life" which was and is the American way.
Thank you to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for providing the ARC of this book in return for my honest review.
#WhatWouldMrs.astorDo? #NetGalley
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