Ward McAllister creator of NYC's "The Four Hundred" (1890)
Satire of Ward McAllister - currently featured on HBO's "Gilded Age"
Above: Print shows a wily, destitute, European noble, with papers extending from his pockets labeled "Laundry Bill, Hotel Bill, Livery Bill, [and] Tailor Bill", seeking a fortune among young American heiresses, as he "hypnotizes" them with the crown of his nobility and they, in their weakened state, kneel before him offering bags of money, to the chagrin of young, well-to-do, American men.
Below: "Snobbish Society's Schoolmaster." Caricature of Ward McAllister as an ass telling Uncle Sam he must imitate "an English snob of the 19th century" or he "will nevah be a gentleman". Published in Judge, November 8, 1890. Uncle Sam is shown laughing heartily.
The Four Hundred was a list of New York society during the Gilded Age, a group that was led by Caroline Schermerhorn Astor, the "Mrs. Astor", for many years. After her death, her role in society was filled by three women: Mamie Fish, Theresa Fair Oelrichs, and Alva Belmont, known as the "triumvirate" of American society.
In the decades following the American Civil War, the population of New York City grew almost exponentially, and immigrants and wealthy arrivistes from the Midwestern United States began challenging the dominance of the old New York Establishment. Aided by McAllister, Mrs. Astor attempted to codify proper behavior and etiquette, as well as determine who was acceptable among the arrivistes, as champions of old money and tradition.
Reportedly, Ward McAllister coined the phrase "the Four Hundred" by declaring that there were "only 400 people in fashionable New York Society." According to him, this was the number of people in New York who really mattered; the people who felt at ease in the ballrooms of high society. In 1888, McAllister told the New-York Tribune that "If you go outside that number," he warned, "you strike people who are either not at ease in a ballroom or else make other people not at ease."
While the number four hundred has popularly been linked to the capacity of Mrs. Astor's ballroom at her large brownstone home at 350 Fifth Avenue and East 34th Street (today the site of the Empire State Building), the exact origins remain unknown. There were, however, other lists in New York around the same time which necessitated a maximum capacity of four hundred, including Delmonico's restaurant and local cotillion dances, that may have contributed to the particular sum of four hundred. ~ Wikipedia
Header image
Title: The European Svengali and the trilbys of the "four hundred" - he hypnotizes 'em every time! / Ehrhart.
Creator(s): Ehrhart, S. D. (Samuel D.), approximately 1862-1937, artist
Date Created/Published: N.Y. : Published by Keppler & Schwarzmann, 1895 October 2.
Library of Congress: LC-DIG-ppmsca-28947
Lower Image
Title: Snobbish Society's Schoolmaster
Date Created/Published: Judge, November 8, 1890
Library of Congress: LC-USZ62-56001