Gotham_ A History of New York City to 1898 - Edwin G. Burrows [371]
Mr. and Mrs. Ernest Fiedler and family at their home on Bond Street, painting by F. Heinrich, 1850. “The houses of the higher classes,” Frances Trollope wrote, were “extremely handsome, and very richly furnished” with the chandeliers, mirrors, carpets, and upholstered furniture that here attest to the Fiedlers’ respectability. Note also the pianoforte and—partially concealed by the Greek Revival ionic columns in the background—a Christmas tree. Not depicted, almost inevitably, are the servants whose labor was essential to maintaining these cozy domestic sanctuaries. (Photograph courtesy of Mr. Nicholas L. Bruen)
Women too utilized the parlor, for Bible readings, charity meetings, after-church teas, and the formal “morning calls” that maintained class boundaries by defining the people to whom one was, or was not, “at home.” For both sexes, moreover, every room accessible to outsiders was a stage for displaying the family’s wealth and sophistication. The most refined houses boasted pianofortes, which cost as much as six hundred dollars (more than a year’s wages for a carpenter or cabinetmaker) and were the basis for fashionable “at home” musical performances. Technologically advanced households also had coal-burning stoves, iceboxes, and gas lights, whose installation and upkeep exceeded the annual rent bill of many poor families.
The genteel parlor was likewise an important adjunct to the upper-class marriage market. Well-bred young men and women took note of one another during the annual cycle of assemblies, balls, and concerts, but a proper courtship didn’t begin until a “beau” gained the privilege of an “at home” visit. Such occasions were closely chaperoned and, as James Fenimore Cooper observed, governed by taboos so strict that a young woman would assume “a chilling gravity at the slightest trespass.” And not without reason, for much hung in the balance: a careless match could plunge an entire family into dishonor and ruin; a good one would bring money and connections sufficient for generations of preeminence. Here, too, Yankees and Knickerbockers saw eye to eye, and many a Yankee entrepreneur won his future in the parlor of a genteel Knickerbocker girl.
The permeability of the membrane separating the spheres of family and business was no less apparent at Christmas, the holiday dedicated to domesticity. By 1830, if not earlier, the week before Santa arrived had become a time for heavy shopping at toy shops, confectionery stores, jewelers, and booksellers. Shopkeepers flogged luxury goods few people purchased at other times of the year, and indeed the season helped legitimate indulgence for a culture that was still consumption-shy. In this context as well, genteel households managed both to lock out commerce and simultaneously contribute to its relentless advance.
TRUE REPUBLICANS
August 16, 1824, a fine summer day: thousands of New Yorkers jammed the Battery to greet the flotilla of steamboats escorting the marquis de Lafayette to Manhattan for the start of a year-long tour of the United States. Stepping ashore at two P.M., the aging Revolutionary hero was swept in magnificent procession out the Battery’s Greenwich Street gate, through Bowling Green, and up Broadway toward City Hall, preceded by mounted buglers. The route was thick with tens of thousands of cheering men and ladies waving handkerchiefs, while a rain of flowers fell from the upper windows of nearby buildings. After a reception at City Hall, Lafayette was settled at the City Hotel and feted at a state banquet that concluded with a balloon ascension.
Any resemblance to an ancient Roman triumph was completely intentional. Conscious of the hoary canard that republics were ungrateful to their benefactors, the Corporation of the City of New York had set out to arrange a reception that, while avoiding unrepublican “pomp” and “ostentatious ceremonies,” would nevertheless pay magnificent homage to one who had labored selflessly