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In HBO’s The Gilded Age Episode 5, we meet Mrs Astor's Mr. McAllister played by Nathan Lane.
Mr. Ward McAllister is the key Bertha Russell
needs to open the doors into Mrs Astors New York Society.
So you might wonder about this Mr McAllister.
Who exactly was Mrs Astors' Mr McAllister and was he a real historical person? Not to mention
what part did he have to play in shaping New York’s high society during the Gilded Age?
To begin with, Ward McAllister was indeed a real,living breathing person from history.
He met Mrs. Astor when he was 45 years old and she was 42 years old.They met through his subscription
balls which where funded by a society that he founded in 1872 called the Society of Patriarchs.
The Society of Patriarchs was a group of 25,
expanding later to fifty, prominent and wealthy businessmen from New York
Society whom McAllister considered men of worth, respectability, and responsibility.
The Patriarchs Balls were modeled on the most popular Balls of the British aristocracy at
that time. Each member of the Society was entitled to invite nine people to the ball
made up of four ladies and five gentlemen, thereby making invitations difficult to
obtain and subsequently establishing the attendees as deemed fit for society.
The balls generally started around ten o'clock in the evening with
stylized dancing up until dinner which was served after midnight.
Before moving to New York in 1852, McAllister had toured Europe and became a connoisseur of
French cuisine so, as you might well expect, the dinners were always prepared by a French chef.
To make the balls even more exclusive, international guests of European aristocrats
were often invited to the balls giving the Americans a chance to rub elbows with nobility.
McAllister's main drive was to turn Americans into European-like aristocracy
as this cartoon in a New York publication points out.
From his earlier travels around Europe, McAllister became an expert in fashionable dress, balls,
foods, wines, and dances. All of which made him an important asset to Mrs. Astor.
Mr McAllister and Mrs Astor were if nothing else, kindred spirits,
because they held in common the view that Society in America was in urgent need of Guidance.
According to McAllister, “Profiteers, boors,
boorish people, people with only money must be kept out.” Thus both Ward McAllister
and Mrs Astor set out to shape New York Society based upon their elitist views.
In fact, Ward McAllister and Mrs. Astor came up with a list of 400 who were deemed to be the cream
of the crop of New York Society. In truth, there were never really 400 names on the list and the
publication of the names, on the list became Mr McAllister's downfall, but more on that later.
So how did Ward McAllister decide Who would be admitted into New York Society?
According to McAllister, in order to be admitted into Society you must have the three B's.
Birth, Background and Breeding. Ward McAllister divided New York Society
into two groups. The Nobs and the Swells. The Nobs were from the old families and
were automatically admitted into Society (unless they were blacklisted for social wrongdoings).
The Swells had to prove themselves.
They were admitted into New York Society by proving that they had proper clothes,
dignified style of entertaining, conduct and acquaintances. And of course, money.
McAllister proposed that the wealthy may share a sense of belonging to a particular social class.
A class consciousness that would bring the finest of the best together.
Mrs. Astor collaborated with McAllister to devise a screening system to keep the right people in,
while keeping the wrong people out. According to contemporary writer and novelist Edith Wharton's
memoirs, the wrong people were the new money rich, merchants, Jews, divorcees, and the like."
Fans of Edith Wharton's novel, Age of Innocence will recognize
McAllister as Sillerton Jackson, the go-to guy for proper form and manners.
All in all, McAllister, a short, chubby balding Southerner became
the arbiter-manager of high society in New York in The Gilded Age.
For 90 minutes every morning,
he would hold court to society’s queens and offer them advice for their parties.
He was a tireless, efficient event designer and manager. From the phrasing of an invitation
to getting carriages ready for guests' departure, Mr McAllister was the person to
advise society matrons on social etiquette and how to throw the best balls in town.
The Strange Alliance of Ward McAllister & Mrs Astor
For Mrs Astor, McAllister was the guardian at the gate.
The first hurdle that Bertha Russell had to surpass as we see in episode 5.
He served an important purpose for Mrs Astor but they were never friends, only allies to the cause.
McAllister oddly called Mrs Astor the Mystic Rose,
referencing her as the heavenly figure in Dante's Paradise around whom all in Paradise revolve.
Strangely enough, in real life McAllister was not a huge social butterfly. His wife was a
shut in and did not appear in society. She was primarily 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 affairs,
but small intimate gatherings in his simple house at 16 East Sixteenth. Mrs Astor never attended.
He himself did have money and was well off but he was not filthy rich like so
many of those he coached to fit into Mrs Astor's idea of high society. And yet he
never lived as though he was wealthy. He simply interacted with those that had all the money.
In HBO's The Gilded Age, I think we are going to see a lot of Mr McAllister
throughout the rest of season one.
Whether we will see Mr McAllisters downfall later on in the series remains to be seen.
McAllister's Downfall
https://www.nysun.com/arts/father-of-the-four-hundred/18321/ (rewrite below)
In 1888, Ward McAllister spoke to the press regarding the Four Hundred people
whom he and Mrs Astor deemed worthy in New York Society. Overnight,
McAllister found the reporter had defined their elitist soicety as Thee Four Hunddred.
At this point, he hadn't named names but 4 years later, while
marketing Mrs. Astor's ball of February 1, 1892, he spoke to the press again.
This time he admitted that 400 was also the capacity of Mrs. Astor's ballroom and he went
so far as to provide the press with a list of names which amouned to only 319 names total.
Much to their despair, McAllister's publicity made them celebrities, and many resented it.
Their feelings were nothing compared with the rage of those left off the list.
Worse yet, he also published his memoirs entitled, Society as I Have Found It. In the publication,
McAllister exposed himself to be a dedicated social climber of great determination.
He portrayed a life of fighting for the acceptance of those he believed his betters,
entering their inner circle and gaining power to exclude others who shared his very same ambitions.
The book, and his hunger for media attention, was McAllister's downfall. The rich didn't like
being exposed. They turned on him quickly and shunned him for the rest of his life.
McAllister died after a brief illness on January 31st 1895. Only five Patriarchs and less than a
score of the Four Hundred attended his services at Grace Church. Mrs. Astor did not attend.