Where the Millionaires Lived

Every city pushes its seams and expands outward, gobbling up land to satisfy its growing population. So it was with New York City in the 1880's. Manhattan is an island with obvious boundaries. So the initial settlements on its southern tip could only move north. The neighborhoods that started as places for the wealthy to live (around the place that's now the Lower East Side) were a bit boggy and so were abandoned for dryer land up north. After the Civil War the wealthy chose the area around 5th Avenue and the Thirties to build their mansions. This is where the rich live in my novel Masquerade. 

I always enjoy basing a house on a real house, and chose the A.T. Stewart mansion that sat on the northwest corner of 5th Avenue and Thirty-fourth. It took over five years to build and when it was finished in 1869 it had cost $1.5 million. In today's money that's about $37.5 million. Pretty much beyond comprehension!

Doesn't it looks like a library? It was the first residential showplace in NYC and was deemed "palatial". This is the foyer and one of the bedrooms. All rooms shown here were figured into scenes in my novel.

Mrs. Stewart also had her own art gallery. She had a huge collection of artwork—that she mostly kept to herself. The art room was 70' x 30' x 50' tall. She and Mr. Stewart had no children yet lived in this 55-room house. He (like my patriarch, Martin Tremaine) earned his fortune by starting a department store: Stewart's Dry Goods. I'll go through details of stores of the time in a separate post.

An interesting thing about the Stewart mansion is that their neighbor to the south was William B. Astor II and his wife, Caroline, or THE Mrs. Astor. She was the head of New York society and her approval or disdain had the power to make or break people. And yet her house was a fairly simple brownstone. Here's a picture of it in 1897. It's the small building on the right. On the left is the original Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. It was built by William Waldorf Astor on the site of his family home after he decided to move to England permanently in 1891. It was built in great part to annoy his Aunt Lina who lived next door. A family feud over who was the head of society and all that.

As early as the 1870's, the encroaching commercialization of the area led the social set to move north to Fifth Avenue and the "Fifties" to build their houses. The bigger the better. The upstart Vanderbilt family created mansions that made the Stewart house look like a guest house. Some of these mansions remain--with new uses, but the Stewart mansion was demolished in 1902. Progress, you know.

And what now sits where the Astor brownstone and the old Waldorf-Astoria sat? The Empire State Building.

If you'd like to read more of my Gilded Age novels, try the sequel to Masquerade, called An Unlikely Suitor,  and A Bridal Quilt, which is in the novella anthology A Patchwork Christmas.  //Nancy Moser

A Symbol of our Freedom for Veterans' Day

*  A Note from Nancy  *

 

On this Veterans Day we thank all our veterans who have served to protect and defend our country.  My family has had a long line of veterans, from my dad in World War II, to a grandfather in World War I, to two great-grandfathers in the Civil War, and another "great" fighting in the Revolutionary War.  God bless America!

Thinking of Veterans ignites a swell of patriotism in my breast.  And the symbol of what our country stands for is the Statue of Liberty.

A month ago she celebrated her 128th birthday...

October 1886.  As we all learned in grammar school, the Statue was a gift from the people of France to the people of the United States, to celebrate the friendship between the two countries that was started during the American Revolution. Basically, if it weren’t for France sending ships and men to help our cause, we all might be talking with a British accent.

The Statue was supposed to come about in 1876, to commemorate the centennial of the Declaration of Independence, but funding issues—on both sides of the Atlantic—made for an ten year delay. The deal was, France would give us the statue and assemble it, and we would build the base to put it on. 


Note the hand on its side

Assembled in France

  



Reassembled in America












To spur Americans to donate, Joseph Pulitzer (of the Pulitzer Prize) used his newspaper, “The World” to shame people into giving. He got after the rich for not giving more, and got after the middle class for relying on the rich to do the giving. It worked.

A foot bigger than mine!

 The sculptor was Frederic Auguste Bartholdi, who asked Gustave Eiffel (the designer of the Eiffel Tower) to figure out the iron framework underneath the copper plating—which was only 3/32” thick.
 

The torch on display in Paris

The Statue was put together in Paris, dismantled into 350 pieces, and packed into 214 crates. Parts of the statue were displayed in Paris during the construction. It took four months to put it all back together.

The presence of the Statue in the harbor--Lady Liberty greeting the influx of millions of immigrants--made her evolve into a symbol of freedom and hope. In 1883, Emily Lazarus wrote the poem “The New Colossus” for an auction to raise money for the pedestal. Only after her death was the poem married with the Statue. Since 1903 the poem has been on a plaque at the foot of the statue.






C.W. Jefferys painting

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame

Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name

Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand

Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command

The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she

With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Enjoy the photos, and remember all she stood for—and has come to stand for.//Nancy

Grand Central Station

You’ve probably heard of the “Commodore” in regard to American history. He—Cornelius Vanderbilt—was the founding father of the Vanderbilt dynasty in the mid-1800’s. He began earning his fortune in steam shipping, and expanded to railroads. He was ruthless, and became one of the richest men in America. When he died in 1877 he left $100 million--$95 million to one son and his four sons, and $2 million each to a grandson and two other sons, and a piddling $250,000-$500,000 each to his eight daughters.  One "wastrel" son, Cornelius, got a $200,000 trust fund. He considered the one lucky son--William Henry Vanderbilt--the only one capable of continuing his business.  And even the ones who received the lesser amounts were considered wealthy for it.

 

Grand Central from Lexington 1890


But enough about the Commodore's wealth, and back to railforads...  In New York City, Vanderbilt bought the key land between 42nd & 48th Street, Lexington to Madison, with the intent of constructing a new train depot. In 1871, at a cost of $6.4 million, the first Grand Central would arise—and be out of date even before it opened. Why? 

It was the time of the Industrial Revolution, and times were changing. Constantly. Even as the Commodore had the Grand Central depot built, the steam engine—for which it was built—was on its way out. Steam engines were noisy, dirty, and potentially dangerous—and one arrived every 45 seconds!


Streetcars arriving at Grand Central


 In 1902 there was a collision in the smoke-filled Park Avenue Tunnel that killed 17 and injured 38 people. This catastrophe fueled the demand for the cleaner electric trains. By the end of 1902 there were plans to demolish GSS and build a double-level terminal. Isn’t that the way? It takes the loss of life to get our attention, and get much-needed changes implemented. Here are some original news articles about it: Grand Central 1902 crash 


Interior 1880's?  This is what I used
in my novel An Unlikely Suitor

 

Another negative about the design was its congestion. Originally the GSS served three rail lines—that each had its own facilities for waiting, baggage, and ticketing. Talk about confusing! The New York Central and Hudson River Railroad, New York and Harlem Railroad, and the New York, New Haven, and Hartford Railroad, all shared the space. 

Clearing the tracks after Blizzard of 1888

Although updated in 1899, in 1913 the GSS that we know now was unveiled, and 150,000 people attended the ceremonies. The 1930’s and 40’s were the heyday of train travel. “In 1947, more than 65 million people -- the equivalent of 40% of the U.S. population -- traveled through Grand Central Terminal.”  

New Grand Central about 1918




But then . . . during the Fifties . . . people started to drive and fly and train travel waned. GSS was nearly demolished to make way for more of the skyscrapers that surround it. But concerned citizens rallied (including Jackie Kennedy Onassis) and the original 1913 station was preserved—and restored. Today it houses many restaurants and shops and gives us a glimpse of the past. //Nancy


Restored Grand Central terminal today


Here is a great website about the Grand Central Station, with some interesting “secrets” and trivia: Grand Central Station Info

Some famous movies filmed there: “North by Northwest”, “The Cotton Club”, “The Fisher King”, “Superman”… and wasn’t there a scene in “The Prince of Tides” filmed there? With the kid playing his violin?  Grand Cental Movies

The Four Hundred

During the last few decades of the 19th century, “The Four Hundred” became synonymous with the cream of New York City society. It was a list of the 400 society elite. And yet, in an odd turn of events, the phrase was coined before the list actually existed…

Remember Ward McAllister, the event-planner, go-to guy for what-was-what and who-was-who I wrote about last week (see"Mr. Society" blog)? It’s said “the Four Hundred” term came about when he was asked by a reporter how many people would be at the next Patriarch’s Ball. McAllister said, “I supposed about as many as the ballroom at Delmonico’s will hold.” The reporter asked for more details. McAllister looked to his wife, who said, “About 400”. The newspapers ran with the idea that there were only 400 in New York City society and coined the phrase “the Four Hundred.” But there was no list.  

Delmonico's Restaurant in the late 1800's



McAllister—always eager to be in the public eye—ran with the idea and started talking about “the Four Hundred” as if it was a real entity. Sometimes he’d say that was the number of people who would fit into Mrs. Astor’s ballroom, and added that 400 was the number of people comfortable there. Not physically. Socially, as in, “If you go outside that number, you strike those who are either not at ease in a ballroom or else make other people not at ease.”



Caroline Astor and Alva Vanderbilt in the 1900's



These kind of statements got everyone talking about who was in and who was out. The pressure to reveal the list was so strong, that in 1892, three years later, McAllister chose the date of Mrs. Astor’s annual ball to reveal the list—which only held 319 names, from only 169 families. The list contained a lot of inaccuracies. Names were misspelled, spouses were missing—or included even though they were dead (more on Caroline Astor next week.) And McAllister wasn’t consistent with his own requirement of “birth, background, and breeding.” Most of the old guard, the “Knickerbocker” families who had run New York from the seventeenth century, were on the list, but not all. There were some newly-rich, and some who just seemed to be there because they were McAllister’s favorites. Even families were divided: some family members on the list, and some not. The only common link was money. Old, new, inherited or earned, everyone on the list passed the test of being wealthy—and so were the prime candidates for the prime parties. The Four Hundred received the attention that we now give to music and movie stars. The press and the public loved hearing about their extravagances—and their troubles.

And yet, amid all their pretension, the members of The Four Hundred were often unsophisticated, obsessed with pretension and rules, not known for their brilliant table-talk, and could be quite prudish. One woman had a party in her new home and was proud of all the classical statues that graced its foyer. But the Four Hundred were appalled at their . . . nakedness. So next time, she covered the offensive parts with handkerchiefs. :o)

The Four Hundred sustained itself into the next century. Quite a feat for something that came about by accident. An excellent book on the subject can be found here:The First Four Hundred by Jerry Pattterson. In the back of the book, Patterson lists the first Four Hundred, and gives some interesting biographical information about most.//Nancy Moser

Mr. Society

Who was Ward McAllister?

An article in "Vanity Fair" in 1889 asked this very question. It said he was the life of the party. He was a well-traveled man who made it a point to take note of what was the best in wining, dining, and entertaining. He learned the ways of society in Europe and came back to the United States an expert. He was Mr. Society--19th century style.


He was largely responsible for making Newport, RI, the summer mecca of the rich. When he began going there in the 1850’s, it was mainly comprised of rich Southern families. Few Northerners were a part of the Newport elite. People waited for McAllister to get there so the fun could begin. “Wait until McAllister comes. He will make it lively.”

From the start, McAllister was big into keeping the gates of society tightly guarded. Regarding Newport society: “Now do not for a moment imagine that all were indiscriminately asked to these little fetes. On the contrary, if you were not of the inner circle, and were a newcomer, it took the combined efforts of all your friends’ backing and pushing to procure an invitation for you. For years, whole families sat on the stool of probation, awaiting trial and acceptance, but many were then rejected, but once received, you were put on an intimate footing with all. To acquire such intimacy in a great city like New York would have taken you a lifetime.” Soon he would be thickly enmeshed in that New York society…


Ward was one of those people who could get a party going and keep it going. In Newport, friends would say to him that they didn’t care about other people’s fancy dinners, but wouldn’t think of missing one of his Newport picnics. He’d often arrange them on a whim, asking a key person for a date, asking what their favorite food was, then drive through Newport, stopping his friends in their carriages, telling them about the picnic date, and getting them to bring some food item. Sometimes he even charged people $20. Yet people paid the price because McAllister always did it up right. He was the king of pleasure. He also was wise enough to say, “There is no society without ladies.” I agree completely.

During the Civil War he stayed away from Newport. “It wasn’t in good form to entertain while the trouble was going on.” The Civil war = "the trouble".  What an understatement. He returned after the war and took up his old position as leader of Newport society. Then he moved his ambition to New York City. He became friends with Mrs. Caroline Astor (the Mrs. Astor) and the two of them bound together to create their version of New York society. In Europe, aristocracy gained their place because of blood lines, but in America, many wealthy people were demanding a place in society by earning their way to prominence. Blue-bloods looked down at new-bloods, the nouveau riche. And yet…there was an acknowledgement that things in America couldn’t be run the same way as they were in Europe. But how to do it?

McAllister offered the idea that those who were wealthy could share a likeness within their class—a class consciousness that would unite the best of the best. Mrs. Astor worked with McAllister to “set up a screening system to keep the right people in, and the wrong ones—new money, tradesmen, Jews, divorcees and the like—out.” (Hermione Lee in Edith Wharton.) Those who are fans of Edith Wharton’s Age of Innocence will see McAllister in the character of Sillerton Jackson, who appears as the go-to guy regarding correct form and manners.


In 1872, McAllister and Mrs. Astor created the Society of the Patriarchs, a group of 25 “men of worth, respectability, and responsibility”. These were the people with the power, the ones who would help create an American high society. Each year they gave the Patriarch ball. Each member was given nine invitations—five for men, and four for women. They would submit their guest list to McAllister, who would okay it. Obviously, an invitation to this event was highly sought after, and if you were invited to it—and other events—you would thereby cement your position in the higher eschelon of society.

But then McAllister made a blunder. He talked to a reporter for the “New York Tribune”: “There are only about four hundred people in fashionable New York Society. If you go outside that number you strike people who are either not at ease in a ballroom or make other people not at ease ... who have not the poise, the aptitude for polite conversation, the polished and deferential manner, the infinite capacity of good humor and ability to entertain or be entertained that society demands.”

McAllister telling Uncle Sam he needs to
be like an English Gentleman


This drew the line in the societal sand. You were either in. Or out. (see blog next week on “The Four Hundred”.) It also showcased McAllister as the keeper of the list—which didn’t even exist at the time. It was created three years later, and only contained 319 names.

Even though McAllister ran among the richest people in America, he never earned more than a modest income. But he did marry well to heiress Sarah Gibbons. Her father had a steamboat grant from Robert Fulton (inventor of the steamboat) and derived $25,000-30,000 annually from wharf property in New York City. In today's dollars, that would be $625,000-750,000. Not too shabby. And yet something must have happened to that money because he never lived as though he was wealthy. He just ran with those who were.


He was the ultimate event-planner. For 90-minutes every morning he would hold court to society’s queens and offer them advice for their parties. He could labor over the wording in an invitation or the correct placement of the flowers. One time, some ladies got angry with him, thinking he was giving preferential treatment to so-and-so’s daughters over their own, and tried to put on a cotillion without him. It was a failure.

Mrs. McAllister did not appear in society and was an invalid, cared for by their daughter, Louise. McAllister would have weekly dinners at his house, but only for six guests, and only attended by Louise and himself as hostess and host. They were not society fetes, but small intimate gatherings in his simple house at 16 East Sixteenth St.

He was not what you would expect. He was not a dandy, wearing fancy clothes. He was middle aged, five foot-ten, weighing 200 pounds. He was balding. What he offered was knowledge of how to entertain well. His way became the way.

But sometimes he got cocky.  He often shared his opinion that New York society was better than society in any other American city. When Chicago held the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893, McAllister commented that if hostesses in Chicago wanted to be taken seriously they needed to hire French chefs and "not frappé their wine too much." I love the response from the "Chicago Journal": "The mayor will not frappé his wine too much. He will frappé it just enough so the guests can blow the foam off the tops of the glasses without a vulgar exhibition of lung and lip power. His ham sandwiches, sinkers, and ... pigs' feet, will be triumphs of the gastronomic art." So there, Ward.

He also raised the ire of Bostonians when he disparaged their young ladies: “They are good scholars, but poor sweethearts. There are, of course, instances when young Boston ladies really do fall in love, but it is of a classical sort which would make the society young man of New York rather uncomfortable.” (June 17, 1894.) He goes on to berate their fashion sense, saying their first concern is whether they can afford a dress. Apparently, the true fashionistas of New York society never bothered to ask that question. If you ask me, it sounds like the young ladies of Boston owned a good deal of common sense, that the dandies in New York didn’t deserve! You can see why McAllister angered people. If you were within his inner circle he was a dear. But otherwise? He was wicked in his assessments, casting you off as inferior.

But then, he finally went too far. In 1890, he wrote his memoirs in a book called Society as I Have Found It, where he detailed his life, his experiences in Europe where he received his education in etiquette, as well as his version of various events in society. He told of his desire to be a part of society and even revealed his glee when he finally became the man who counseled the same. New York society was not amused.

By the 1890’s, McAllister was a quaint old man with old-fashioned ideas; a man who'd written a tell-all book that had told too much of the celebrities of the day—the wealthy. He died alone at a restaurant. In an article in the "New York Times" about his death, one society gentleman is quoted as saying, "Poor McAllister! What a pity it is he wrote a book!"//Nancy Moser

A Day at the Park

I've always been in awe of Central Park. Knowing the perniciousness (ooh!  big word) of the American penchant for letting commercial properties expand their domain over whatever stands in their way, I’m shocked that it hasn’t been gobbled up by some developer during its 151 year history. Its exceptional existence is best realized with an aerial view. Someone had foresight. Someone had vision.

It all started in 1853 when some of the wealthy residents of Manhattan put out the idea that a park should be created in New York City. They’d seen the lovely parks in London and Paris and wanted their own bragging rights in the United States. It could be a park where they could take carriage rides and where working class people could find recreation. In 1853, after three years of public debate, the city took over 700 acres of land via eminent domain (that’s when the state seizes private property—with compensation but without the owner’s consent—for public use.) What existed at the site at the time were poor neighborhoods. Sixteen hundred people had to move for the sake of the park. Irish pig farmers, German gardeners, and a vital African-American community called Seneca Village, were displaced for the greater good. But the 700 acres wasn’t great land to begin with—which is why it hadn’t been developed commercially. It was swampy and rugged, with rocky outcroppings. The original boundaries were Fifth to Eighth Avenues, from 59th and 106th streets. In 1863 it was extended to 110th Street, which brought Central Park up to its current 843 acres.



Bethesda Terrace under construction 1862



Bethesda Terrace today

Central Park became the first landscaped public park in the United States. Its design came about because of the country’s first landscape contest. The winners were Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux.

They wanted to combine a pastoral feeling like the Ramble and Sheep meadow (that had sheep present into the 1930’s!) with more formal areas like the Mall (the Promenade) and the Bethesda Fountain. Bowing to opinion, they adapted their design to allow separate paths for carriage, horse, and pedestrian use. To do so, they had to create forty bridges--no two the same.

They also had to blast out solid rock to make the reservoirs and change the terrain. They used more gunpowder for blasting than was used in the (then future) Battle of Gettysburg. Over 20,000 men labored on the park, moving 3,000,000 cubic yards of soil and planting 270,000 trees and shrubs. Imagine all those seedlings and baby plants. The vista was obviously not as lush as it is now. But it was a beginning. The park officially opened in winter 1859, just in time for ice skating. Soon after, the park had over seven million visitors a year!

Yet originally, the park was bedeviled by rules of who could use it—and how. Group picnics were banned, and if you were a tradesman you couldn’t take your family on a ride in the park using the wagon you used for your business. If kids wanted to play ball? They had to have a note from the principal of their school! Stupid rules meant to keep the park pristine for the upper class. There was of course a public outcry and eventually the rules were eased. A zoo was added in 1871, a carousel, lawn tennis and such, making it much more democratic. Many changes (additions and deletions) have been made over the years, adapting to the times. The original Central Park Reservoir—that used to provide water to the city—was renamed the Jaqueline Kennedy Onassis Revervoir in 1994. Jackie O had an apartment overlooking the park and jogged there for years. Also, over 200 movies have been made using areas of the park. If you’ve seen the movies "Enchanted" (love the dance scene!), "Serendipity", "Breakfast at Tiffany’s", "When Harry Met Sally", "27 Dresses", and a myriad of “Law & Order” episodes . . . you’ve seen clips filmed in Central Park.

The Mall (Promenade)

In my novel Masquerade, I had my characters at the Bethesda Terrace (shown above as it was being constructed in 1862.) I have them comment on the Angel of the Waters fountain. I have them taking a stroll down the Mall… It’s somehow comforting to know that my 1886 characters saw what I can see today.//Nancy Moser

The Ladies Mile

When we shop we often go to a mall, where all the stores are consolidated in one place. But just like the idea of the department store (see last week's blog), the idea of creating an area especially for shopping is over 160 years old. In the late 1850's in New York City, the Ladies Mile was born. The demand for "department stores" was growing so quickly, the retailers responded by moving close together uptown. The area on Broadway and 6th Avenue between 9th and 23rd Streets, came to be called the "Ladies Mile" (it's now encompassed in the "Flatiron District".)

Remember the saying, Build it and they will come. Oh yeah. They came. In droves. An article in the New York World newspaper said that if you wrote out a listing of all the items sold at Macy's it "would reach Central Park." The article further described Macy's, saying it had "spread itself out along Fourteenth Street and Sixth Avenue until one is at a loss to tell where it begins or where it ends. It is a bazaar, a museum, a hotel, and a great fancy store all combined."
Adding to the allure were large windows showing off the merchandise. Again, we take this for granted, but "window shopping" was something new in the nineteenth century. It started with Bloomingdale's. The usual practice was to clutter up a display window with a bunch of goods available inside. But Bloomingdale's—and soon all the other stores—started decorating the windows with fewer items and more props, creating scenes and an ambiance. A lure to come inside.

Henry Collins Brown, curator of the Museum of the City of New York in 1892, said the Ladies Mile had a "champagne sparkle." Further, "All the world came to Broadway to shop, to dine, to flirt, to find amusement, and to meet acquaintances." Department stores lined the street, but there were also exclusive specialty stores like Brooks Brothers, Tiffany's, and Thorley's House of Flowers. Thorley's was the first florist to use the long white box full of long-stemmed flowers packed in tissue. The exterior of their building was also an attraction, as it was decorated top to bottom with plants and flowers.

Many of these buildings remain--repurposed as the stores moved north. You can see photos here: Ladies Mile Historic District//Nancy Moser

Let's go Shopping!

Shop 'til you drop. In regard to women and shopping, my husband teases me, saying that women stand outside stores waiting for them to open, yelling, "I've got money! Let me in!"

Actually, the day after Thanksgiving that's not far off. Last year I went out at 5 a.m. for a special deal. When I came out of the store I was taken aback to realize the sun was just coming up.

Is this love of shopping a new phenomenon? Nope. Enclosed malls may be a fairly recent invention, but the department store? It's been around New York City since 1858. Pre-Civil War. Macy's was one of the first, but other stores eventually popped up: Lord & Taylor, Bergdorf Goodman, Bloomingdale's, and A.T. Stewart's.

Stewarts isn't around anymore, but it was the inspiration for the department store owned by the Tremaines in my novel Masquerade. Their original downtown store at 280 Broadway can still be seen and is known as the "Sun Building" because the New York Sun newspaper had its offices there for decades. Stewart's was heralded for its grand staircase and skylit atrium. You didn't just go to the department stores to shop, but to have an experience.

Many of the stores got such a following that they began to manufacture their own brand of goods. Macy's had "Red star" silk and velveteen, and were the exclusive distributor of Foster kid gloves in New York. They also made their own line of underclothing, linen articles, and men's shirts.

Stores began to advertise—which was heretofore unheard of. And as competition grew, they earned their customers' business by offering additional services. "Granted that the merchandise was of acceptable quality, people tended to patronize the stores which gave them the most attractive surrounds, the most convenient delivery, and the most satisfactory all-around treatment." In 1888 Macy's announced it would deliver goods in a 100-mile radius for free ($5 minimum order.) It worked well. In 1896-97 Macy's delivered 2.5 million packages a year! Seventy-five percent were delivered by Macy's own people (at a cost to them of 7.85 cents per package) with the rest subbed out for delivery (which cost 8.75 cents/package.)

Unlike many of its competitors, Macy's didn't allow customers to buy on credit. "Cash only" kept their prices down. A perk we take for granted was considered revolutionary at this time: the ability to return goods. Customer satisfaction came to the forefront, allowing customers to return defective merchandise. But it wasn't as carte blanche as it is today. There had to be a reason. But Macy's always gave you more than you asked for.  They erred on the side of the customer.

Some stores offered luxurious "rest" rooms for those who'd traveled from a distance. In 1892 Macy's advertised a sumptuous ladies "waiting room" that included $11,200 in artwork (about $250,000 in today's money.) Lunchrooms made it possible to stay on the premises to refuel. Elevators made it easy for customers to have access to additional floors. Electric lights and even electric fans made shopping more pleasurable: "Electric fans supply artificial breezes. They're as pleasant and inspiring as the winds that blow from wooded hill tops."  Department stores opened up another job opportunity to young women, many who left home to work there. One young woman, Margaret Getchell La Forge, started as a cashier at Macy's but was promoted to bookkeeper and then superintendent—one of the first women executives.

Macy's was determined to undercut the prices of all others. They had employees who scoured their competitors' stores to make sure Macy's prices were lowest. Once, in 1902, Macy's had some Japanese silks that sold for .41/yard. Hearn & Son started a price war. It ended the next day with Macy's selling the product for 11 yards for .01! This kind of price slashing was rare, but Macy's was also known for advertising comparative prices for like items. What one did, the others were often forced to do to keep up.

Dresses were often customized and made in-house. In Masquerade I have a "Pretty Woman" type scene, with the main character trying on clothing in a department store, with her man sitting close by, giving his approval—and paying the tab. In the 1886 Bloomingdale's catalog, clothing was offered in a multiple of color and fabric options. And if you wanted the trim changed, you simply had to include a fabric swatch so they could match the color. If you ordered a hat, you were to state your complexion color so a hat could be made that was flattering. This illustration shows a dress from the Bloomingdale's catalog. The caption says: "No. 41. Very handsome suit of plain material, trimmed with yak-lace; skirt with 3 rows of lace flouncing; short front drapery looped at side with ribbon bows; puffed back drapery; plain jersey waist; camel's hair or homespun. $21.75 and 24.50. No 42. Same of Cashmere or Nun's Veiling, trimmed with Egyptian or oriental lace….. $16.50, 18.75 and 20.50."

Catalogs were created for rural customers to pour over. Hence the term "wish books". If you ever find an original one, hang onto it, as they were so heavily used it's hard to find one intact.

Then, as now, shopping in department stores was often a women's event. Men were slower to change their ways and buy their clothing at such a place. That's why many stores put the men's departments on the first floor, to lure men inside for a quick job of it.  My husband would approve.

What did small specialty shops think of the department stores? What do small stores today think of Wal-mart and Target? They were not—and are not—amused. But progress will not be denied.  I have money!  Let me in! /Nancy Moser