Evolving U.S. Women’s Etiquette, 1909

“The old fashioned stay at home woman, who found complete satisfaction and happiness within the four walls of her own house, is almost obsolete. Committees, clubs and social entertainments of all kinds fill a large proportion of the twentieth century woman’s hours.” – Above, Marguerite, the college educated, intelligent, socially and philanthropically busy woman of 1909. 

Concerning Calling

The “afternoon call” is doomed, and few will shed tears over its passing. It is a relic of more leisurely times. With its atmosphere of artificiality and affectation, its babel of tongues voicing meaningless nothings, it was a purely conventional function. Conversation, in the true sense of the word, never flourished there. None went away mentally richer than she came.

To what may we attribute the decline of the afternoon tea party? Some assert that the reason lies in the failure of men to attend these functions. Women, they declare, become bored to death in each other’s society, and so the tea party inevitably tended to disappear. This is far from the truth. Women have never found so much pleasure in each other’s society as they do today.

Others see in it a decline of the social instinct. This, again, is a mistaken view on the face of it. The modern woman is essentially gregarious. The old fashioned stay at home woman, who found complete satisfaction and happiness within the four walls of her own house, is almost obsolete. Committees, clubs and social entertainments of all kinds fill a large proportion of the twentieth century woman’s hours. – From “Good Form,” 1909

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