Meet the late-Demita Usher. She was an Etiquette Consultant, owner of the Social Graces and Savior-Faire School of Etiquette, and the instructor trainee of mine who prompted me to start this free site. She felt that there should be a website dedicated to the history of etiquette and dispelling etiquette myths. I realized a few months ago that I should spotlight Demita’s early contributions and her role in pushing me to create it in the first place. Sadly, and very suddenly, the etiquette community lost Demita when she passed away in June of 2015 at the age of 42. Above, a 2015 selfie of Etiquipedia Contributor, author and teacher, Demita Usher, Founder of “Social Graces and Savior-Faire.”
Below are links to just a few of Demita Usher’s numerous articles on etiquette you’ll find on Etiquipedia:
Etiquette Knows No Color
Language Etiquette: From Preppy to PC
Dido Belle: Georgian Etiquette’s Rigid Rules
Etiquette for a Graceful Walk
Gilded Age Table Etiquette
Etiquette and Victorian Fan FictionThe Definitive Selfie Etiquette Guide
Vintage and Modern Picnic Etiquette
BBQ Etiquette for Grillers and Guests
As a Q. & A. with Demita is impossible, I will share as much information as I can with our Etiquipedia readers:
What was the impetus for Demita starting her Etiquette business?
In my first conversation with Demita, I discovered that she had an extensive collection of old fashioned, “charm school books” from the 1950’s and 1960’s. She had been collecting them for years. Her favorites were part of the collection of books (and even a vinyl record album!) from the Montgomery Ward department store chain’s, Wendy Ward School of Charm.
Demita loved the decor and fashions from the post WWII, atomic era, and belonged to a few vintage clothing clubs and organizations in Los Angeles. She also volunteered with many different charitable groups and would often send photos of herself with various celebrities who were also helping out.
An etiquette business seemed like a perfect fit for Demita after the real estate market had crashed in Southern California and she lost her job with a mortgage company. She had taken odd part-time jobs to get by, and then eventually pay for her training with me. She wrote articles for several online magazines under the nom de plume, “Brown Betty,” among others, and she began working with me in May of 2011.
What did Demita enjoy teaching the most?
She loved teaching basic social graces and etiquette history. She was a natural born teacher and excelled with groups of all ages. She had a real connection though with teenaged girls in her classes. She relished the role of “mentor” and as one young woman who she had become friends with wrote in an email to me about 2 weeks after her passing, “She was always 10000% for me and others that she brought and made known their gifts. I'm glad I have a way of getting in contact with you as she was one of my close friends. Even now, she brings people together. I have met her family and some of her other friends and it feels like we know each other from the stories we shared! I would love to know more about the things you teach and what she did. I really miss her. She was such a wonderful person and she really brought out the best in you and made you aware of your gifts. She was a confidant and true friend.”
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| Demita working with one of our young students early in her training. |
Demita enjoyed teaching children and teens something new that she knew would stay with them long after the classes were over. She delighted in notes of thanks which she received from some of her students. She would often send me photos of those notes. A few years ago, I came across two written notes of thanks, one for each of us, from a student in a series of classes we had taught together. They were tucked into a book which had been put away with materials from our last class.
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| “If she's perky and pretty and sparkles... if she's confident and knows what to say... she's a girl who knows about beauty... ... bet she learned it the Wendy Ward Way” – Image from the back of the Wendy Ward School LP course, circa early 1960’s. |
Who were some of the older etiquette authors or authorities Demita enjoyed most?
Demita was a fan of any retro etiquette or charm school books she could find in used book stores. She had a collection that rivaled any I had seen. The Wendy Ward Charm School books were her favorites, however.
For more information on Demita Usher, you can read my personal blog post after her passing in 2015 here:
🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia
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