Yesteryear Etiquette: A Quiz

Did these well-dressed women, sitting pretty on a running board, follow etiquette's dictates?

Did you catch Downton Abbey last Sunday on PBS? While the soap-opera-like storyline of a wealthy family in 1912 England will keep viewers riveted, the etiquette of the residents and household staff of the stately home is equally fascinating to me. For the past 15 years, I've studied such turn-of-the-century etiquette and collected etiquette books — there are dozens — of that era. Interestingly, etiquette rules were no less taxing stateside, especially for the upper and middle classes. 

Take this mini-quiz to determine how well you might fare etiquette-wise if you woke up tomorrow as a young woman in 1912. 

1. As you walk down the street, you recognize a gentleman approaching with whom you have danced at a recent ball. You:
A. Keep your eyes focused ahead and acknowledge his presence only if he first greets you.
B. Offer a simple "Good morning."
C. Nod while offering a small smile.
2. You are a debutante and have accepted an invitation to a small garden party at your cousin's home. Suddenly, you are presented with a more enticing engagement. You:
A. Make a social call to your cousin to explain the need to change plans.
B. Keep your first engagement, no matter the more welcome invitation.
C. Ask your cousin politely if she might consider postponing her event.
3. You are visiting an art museum in the city when you come across a nude painting by Pierre-Auguste Renoir. You:
A. Avert your eyes from the licentious rendering and walk quickly to the adjacent gallery.
B. Sit primly on the nearby bench and sketch the masterpiece.
C. Appreciate the beauty of the painting and vow to learn more about Renoir.
4. You are seated at a formal dinner party. A young woman about your age arrives and is introduced to you. You:
A. Nod and smile.
B. Nod, smile and murmur her name.
C. Rise, nod, smile and murmur her name.
5. You are attending a matinee theater performance to which you have worn your favorite chapeau. You:
A. Leave it on — women are allowed to wear hats indoors.
B. Check it at the door when you enter the theater.
C. Remove it before the curtain rises.



1. C. When a young woman sees a man on the street with whom she has danced at a ball, "she bends her head slightly, looks directly at the person recognized, according him, at the same time, a slight smile or an amiable glance . . . though no further acquaintance may ever after exist between them." — Encyclopaedia of Etiquette, 1910

2. B. "A [débutante] must be punctual at all appointments, keep her engagements, and not change after accepting when something more delightful appears, answer invitations promptly, express appreciation for any kindness, look her prettiest and be always amiable and most charming even if her gown is spoiled and she has enjoyed only a few hours of sleep." — Etiquette, 1923

3. A. "Just as a conscientious, God-fearing girl would not read one page or one line of a book she knew to be bad, even so must she be taught to turn her eyes away unhesitatingly and instinctively, from an indecent engraving, or painting, or sculpture, no matter where she happens upon it. . . so that even when alone she stumbles on such objects, she would turn her eyes and her whole mind away from the object, as she would withdraw her hand or arm from the contact of red-hot iron." — The Mirror of True Womanhood, 1903
4. C. "A nod, a smile, and a murmur of the name, constitute full recognition of an introduction. . . . A woman rises to receive an introduction to one of her own sex." — Encyclopaedia of Etiquette, 1921
5. C. "At a matinee, a really considerate woman takes off her hat before the curtain rises." — Encyclopaedia of Etiquette, 1920 

Did you get. . . ?
1 - 2 answers right: Back in the day, your mother would have hung her head in shame.
3 - 4 answers right: Good thing you live in 2011.
5 answers right: Attagirl! You're a clever one! 

What Olive Opened, Christmas 1914

Christmas 1914: Among the gifts 20-something Olive opened was a gift record from "Mable and Lydia." In this small paper pamphlet, tied with a red ribbon, Olive carefully tracked all the gifts she gave and received for the next six Christmases, through 1920. Eventually she became a friend of my grandmother, and through various hands passed her gift record until it came to mine this December.

A peek into this slim volume reveals the gifts given to a young woman at the time. Accessories, clothing — or fabric for making clothing — and books were popular, much as they are today. What's not popular today? Handkerchiefs, a plethora of which fill many lines of Olive's list, both as gifts given and gifts received. What else did Olive find under her tree that morning, Christmas 1914?

• An ivory mirror and comb from "Mamma"

• Drawnwork (embroidered) sheet and pillowcases from Grandma

• Dresser scarf from Martha

• Silk hose from Aunt Sophia

• Rambler Rose Waist — in other words, a printed blouse — from Aunt Martha

• Leather writing case from Aunt Mary

• Crocheted collar and cuffs from Aunt Alma

• Ribbon wrist bag from Auntie Hanson

• Japanese print from Marcella

• Henry Van Dyke's popular book The Spirit of Christmas from Thekla

• And a "Good Cheer" calendar from Ida

Huskies today, "Lassies" yesterday

Women's basketball is big news today, thanks to UConn's Huskies beating the 88-game winning streak set by the University of California's men's team back in the 1970s.  Had it been a men's team to break the L.A. team's record, there would have been more coverage. No doubt.

But women's basketball has long been making history. In fact, just one year after John Naismith invented "basket ball" in 1891, Smith's College organized the first women's basketball team. Four years later, the first women's intercollegiate basketball championship was played between Stanford and the University of California at Berkley — before a crowd of 700 women.

Around the same time, high schools (including Western High School, Washington, D.C. — see inset), companies and local clubs started women's basketball teams, including such all-black girls' teams as the New York Girls and the Spartan Girls.

One New York Times story in 1907 reported on the Colgate YMCA women's team hosting two others: "The playing was fast and rough, and the girls were sprawling on the floor several times after lively scrimmaging. . . . There were many fouls called, not necessarily because the girls meant to be rough, but because they entered into the spirit of the contest with so much vim and aggressiveness that they slammed each other up against the wall with anything but girlish gentleness."

But all this ardor for b-ball wasn't without controversy. A number of colleges began banning women's basketball from intercollegiate competition. The Amateur Athletic Union took the position that women and girls shouldn't play basketball in public. And the split bloomers the players wore? In 1907, the Illinois State High School Athletic Association declared the costumes "objectionable" and that "the record of blacked eyes, scratched countenances and bruised bodies of the last season is an argument against the game as far as the lassies are concerned." At the time, that meant all 300 girls' basketball teams had to cancel their games.

Despite all that and even during women's baskeball decline before the passage of Title IX, girls and women have always played hoops. Congratulations to the Huskies for continuing to make history. 

P.S. December is Black Women's Basketball History Month.

You think Black Friday’s mobs are brazen?

Seemingly well-mannered shoppers window shop during the holiday season in New York City.                   Library of Congress Prints & Photographs.

Actually, crazed Christmas shoppers are simply following tradition. Back in December 1900, a gentleman was put upon to go Christmas shopping and was so enraged by his treatment by female shoppers and clerks that he wrote a letter to the editor of The New York Times to complain. Here’s a snippet:

“[At No. 1 store] a more brazen, impudent, uncouth, ill-bred, and indecent specimen of womanhood has never before been on public exhibition. . . . At No. 2 there was simply a mob of women pulling, hauling, and crowding, affording just the kind of an opportunity sought by thieves and pickpockets. . . . At No. 3 the crowd was largely from the country, consequently it was more orderly and decent, but at No. 4 . . .the clerks showed more impudence than a grass-fed mule.  This experience, however, [was] well worth the expense and discomfort attending it, for it fairly demonstrated that a man has no rights which a woman respects in a department store, and therefore hereafter he cannot be expected to [shop for] Christmas presents.”

 So what were these “impudent vixens” buying back in 1900?

• gunmetal banks for children,

• fur coats for dolls,

• 25-cent toy cars,

• pretty silk-covered coat hangers — three for $1.25,

• needle cases, each the size of a "doll's opera-glass" case,

• traveler's inkstands, each packed inside a man's hatcase-shaped leather box,

• wood-famed petite calendars,

• luncheon name cards decorated with floral designs,

• ivory smoking sets, and

• elaborate silver toilet articles — mirrors, brushes, bottles and glove boxes.