The Great 20th C. Etiquette Era

If you are a regular Etiquipedia reader, you have probably noticed that throughout time, several distinct “ golden eras” have seen a popular resurgence in the desire for the development of better manners and learning etiquette. The 1920’s until the late-1930’s was one such golden “etiquette era” in the United States (and to a certain extent, the United Kingdom.) Following WWI and the Great Influenza, as with other similar periods through the ages, new advances in communication, travel, medicine and technology were quickly spreading around the world. Any period like this in history will generally bring back a surge in popularity for education in manners. Numerous etiquette books and pamphlets, for children, teens and adults, were published. W.C. Green’s “Dictionary of Etiquette,” Emily Holt’s “Encyclopedia of Etiquette” and Lillian Eichler’s “Etiquette” and “Etiquette Jr.” were extremely popular. Emily Post’s first major book on etiquette, the Blue Book of Social Usage, was the number one non-fiction bestseller of 1923. “What would Emily do?” became a common phrase during the era. 

The 1920’s: A Golden Era of Etiquette

You can hardly pick up a magazine nowadays without reading something about etiquette, which is one of the highly advertised things of the times. There are as many or more advertisements about how to make money, along with these manuals of manners. The two seem to work together in a way. In the old days when Kings and Queens were in fashion, the business of fine manners was confined to royal courts. Then it got into the drawing rooms or parlors, and now we are trying to run it into the scramble of modern life. That’s why the books on etiquette are on sale. Our ancestors had the manners. We have treatises on the subject. But goodness knows there’s need of something to keep us from being crude and boorish. 

We live at such a pace and are so full of the go-getting spirit that our manners are ripped off, the way lace would be, if we wore any these days. But at the same time, I can’t just savvy why a person who has any kind of feelings and as much good sense, needs a book to tell him or her how to behave. We are supposed to do that sort of thing naturally. The attempt to get good manners by buying a fancy book is just about as foolish as the idea of making money by reading about gold mines. About all the etiquette book can do is to call your attention to the fact that there is still room for manners in this world, which is jammed so full of people that they keep parking out on one another’s toes. The real manners which a person should have and display, the way flappers reveal knees, are things that you must cultivate for yourself. If you haven't the etiquette urge, the book isn’t going to put it into you. 

The best recipe for manners is The Golden Rule. Act as though you bad some idea that the other person is more or less like yourself. If you don’t like being pushed into the gutter, chances are the other fellow isn't itching to be bumped off the curb either. And the positive side of manners depends upon your baring self-condfidence and strength. To have good manners you must assert yourself—but in a clever way. You must have poise, which is only personality nicely balanced. If you are shame-faced, and overmodest, you will make other people feel wriggly, and that isn’t good manners, is it? My recipe would be —equal parts of strength and fineness, well mixed. Or you can cook it up by combining egoism with altruism, love of others and self-respect. Season with pepper. That's a popular commodity and in good taste. Use sugar—but not too much. Employ a certain amount of pep and sweetness, as also regard for others, and the book of etiquette need never be read. – Coronado Eagle and Journal, 1929

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Etiquette Training – Early is Best

Good manners are but the expressions of a nature controlled... The rules of good breeding cannot be learned late in life, politeness cannot be assumed when one enters society at a given age. Training in good manners must be begun when the baby first learns to speak and continued through the years, for politeness is not always innate and spontaneous.

“Facts on Etiquette”

“Etiquette is not a body of formulas for the use of adults only; the rules of good breeding cannot be learned late in life, politeness cannot be assumed when one enters society at a given age. Training in good manners must be begun when the baby first learns to speak and continued through the years, for politeness is not always innate and spontaneous. The child does not know that all life is made smoother and simpler and sweeter by good behavior, and so this precept and its practice must be early inculcated. This constant rubbing off of rough comers produces a polish that makes it possible for the child to grow into the adult without awkwardness. Good manners are but the expressions of a nature controlled. They may be artificial, but anything is better than bad manners.” – The Weekly Calistogan, 1914

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Teens Demanded Etiquette Classes?

Yes! In 1939, teens in the United States demanded instruction in good manners. That this wave of high school enthusiasm was nation-wide, was reported by Edith Stern in the educational journal, School and Society. – “Homes no longer teach gracious behavior, she finds, and youngsters find themselves miserable and embarrassed for lack of definite instruction. The teen-ager has discovered that good manners have something to do with popularity, and ultimately, says Miss Stern, with the ability to get and hold jobs.” 

Young Americans Demand Lessons in 

Best Manners

Young Americans are demanding—yes, demanding—lessons on manners. Starting with how to eat an olive in one lesson, on up to the subtleties of how to be polite though annoyed—high school boys as well as girls are surprising their teachers by eagerness to learn courtesy and tact. That the wave of high school enthusiasm is nation-wide is reported by Edith Stern in the educational journal, School and Society. 

Santa Rosa, California, has had to limit its course in etiquette to juniors and seniors, to avoid overcrowding. Students in Phoenix, Arizona, and in Minneapolis have written their own etiquette books, based on hundreds of questions asked by the boys and girls themselves. In a Missouri classroom, a teacher asked 41 freshmen how many had ever made an introduction and got seven raised hands in reply. When she asked if the class would like to be taught, a chorus of “Yeahs” arose. 

Psychological reasons backing up the young people’s eagerness to acquire polish are suggested by Miss Stern. Homes no longer teach gracious behavior, she finds, and youngsters find themselves miserable and embarrassed for lack of definite instruction. The teen-ager has discovered that good manners have something to do with popularity, and ultimately, says Miss Stern, with the ability to get and hold jobs. 

“New and interesting devices of instruction” are being experimentally evolved. A Baltimore high school has rehearsals of school dances. Baltimore seventh graders listen and learn telephone etiquette by aid of two disconnected phone receivers at ends of a long table. A California school teaches how to order dinner, using real menus supplied by local hotels. Elmdale, Kansas, uses the dramatic method, showing good restaurant manners acted at one side of a stage, and everything wrong at the other side. – San Pedro Pilot, 1939

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Etiquette and Its History

The History of Etiquette

Etiquette is a form of fashion more important than style in dress, for the reason that the varying codes of manners have influenced morals, something changing the cut of a coat cannot be said to have done. When etiquette demanded that a gentleman accept a challenge or acknowledge himself a coward in the minds of his fellow citizens, it encroached sharply upon ethics. Now that it has gone out of fashion to kill, gentlemen find small difficulty in keeping the sixth commandment. The less formal etiquette becomes, the less wanton taking of life there is among those who consider good breeding of consequence. 

As the civilized race now stands, either man or woman can be refined, regardless of shape of hat he or she wears. This was true in any century, but 200 years ago and back of that period, a gentleman and lady could, according to approved etiquette, gobble food with their hands from a common dish set in the center of the dining table and filled with the entire fashionable bill of fare prepared for the occasion. Gratefully we now acknowledge such proceedings to he “bad form” and in so doing pronounce ourselves two centuries removed from the table manners of swine and one point away from that brute, no matter how similar to him our turn of mind may remain in some other respects. –National Magazine, 1901

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Victorian Beach Bathing Etiquette

 “As to the hose, they are indeed; a necessary adjunct to the bathing suit, if you would be modestly and properly clad...” Appropriate Victorian and Edwardian era beach costumes for women (as exhibited above) required women wear stockings for sea bathing in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s: Ever kindly and given to loaning wisdom from her store, the charitable and impassioned authoress made haste to warn the puzzled maidens against any sockless tempting of Neptune. 

Questions on Sea Bathing Etiquette

Miss Libbey is an authoress. She is also an authority on the proprieties of sea bathing. It appears that “Two Young Girls,” having heard of Laura Jean as one freighted down with seashore etiquette, wrote to Miss Libbey, asking, “should young girls go bathing with male escorts?” and, likewise, “Would it be considered vulgar to go into the surf without stockings?” Ever kindly and given to loaning wisdom from her store, the charitable and impassioned authoress made haste to warn the puzzled maidens against any sockless tempting of Neptune. 

Said she in one of her finest passages: “I feel bound to advise any girl reader to abstain from bathing in company of lover, friend or male acquaintance on general principles. In the first place, even a pronounced beauty can and often does look hideous in the water. A man sees her at her worst, which is not advisable, and he never forgets the ludicrous picture she makes.” In another outburst, founded no doubt upon her own investigation beside the sobbing deep, she cried out in this fashion: 

“You would not permit a man to put his arms about you waking along the public thoroughfare. Why accord him that privilege in the surf? ‘Ah,’ you answer, ‘it is different in the water. There is danger in those great big waves that come booming in, and I am glad to have him to cling to, I'm sure.’ You have no business to be where there is danger, my dear. As to the hose, they are indeed; a necessary adjunct to the bathing suit, if you would be modestly and properly clad. 

“Exuberance of spirits is all very well among a number of young girls disporting among the waves (here we bow to an old friend in the matter of phrases), but when gentlemen are present take great care not to become boisterous, for they will most assuredly take their cut as to how they shall behave from you. Summer is very delightful and one of its choicest pleasures is the sea bath, invigorating alike to mind and body, but great care should be observed that it be not abused.” – Santa Cruz Sentinel, 1900

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Etiquette, Hand Kisses and Shakes

Chaucer commends his gentle Princess for her white hand and taper fingers and the cleanly fashion in which she dined. Nowadays the modern belle has the finger-bowl to help her, and she can cleanse her fingers after an olive in a bowl of rose-water. It is a curious contradiction that a man takes care of his hand as he drives, runs, or plays ball or cricket, wearing a thick dogskin glove. The Prince of Wales covers his hand from sun and wind, then goes to a ball with his rosy ringers uncovered, except by rings. 

One would think, since the science of palmistry has so become a favorite a pastime, and if there be only a step between divination and prophecy, that the lines formed by an oar, or a ball bat, would confuse the lines of long life, hand fortune, one husband or more, so that the old fashioned, sleeping in chicken skin gloves, would come back again. A soft hand is very comforting to the sick, and a child who is ailing loves the soft hand of his mother on his head. It is a marvelous poultice for his aches and pains. As an object to kiss, a white and well kept hand is very important. The kiss of respect should be imprinted on the hand. It is a continental fashion still and might well be introduced on our shores. The hand is, after all, the natural member to salute. The nerves of touch are most highly developed in the finger, and the charm of the hand is its grasping power, which enables the giver to denote every shade of cordiality, to vary the salute at pleasure. 

There is everything in the hand. It has actioning freemasonry. If only two fingers are extended, if no prehensile thumb completes the maneuver, farewell to cordiality. If a strong hand catches a weak one and gives to it a grip which mashes the bones, farewell to friendship. Let the hand-shake be warm, cordial and welcome—the juste milieu of salutation. The French rarely shake hands, and only with intimate friends. They often give the left hand as nearer the heart, “la main du couer,” they call it. On the Continent the etiquette of hand-shaking is observed with delicacy. No man should assume to shake hands with a lady unless she extends her hand first. It is the privilege of a superior to offer a hand. In a ball-room there is no shaking of hands. The more public the place of introduction, the less hand-shaking takes place. Still, among effusive foreigners, both hands are frequently extended to old friends. 

The Irish hand, among a peasantry who labor from the cradle to the grave, is almost universally small and well shaped. It is a Milesian trait; whether potatoes, bog-tretting, poor living, political disturbances, shillalahs and damp climate improve the hand we know not, but the Irish lass has a pretty hand. No matter how much they cook, wash or dig, tbe knuckles seldom grow to be large and prominent, as in the English and Scotch hand. Tbe American hand is sinewy, and, as we have observed, does not follow the example of the American foot in being beautiful. No doubt the accomplishments are somewhat trying to the hand, such as playing the harp, the zither, the guitar, the banjo. The nails of a musician are apt to betray him. There is an eccentricity peculiar to the handwriting of executive musicians, as witnessed in that part of Beethoven. But this need not be attributable wholly to the use of the hand. 

Chaucer commends his gentle Princess for her white hand and taper fingers and the cleanly fashion in which she dined. Nowadays the modern belle has the finger-bowl to help her, and she can cleanse her fingers after an olive in a bowl of rose-water. It is a curious contradiction that a man takes care of his hand as he drives, runs, or plays ball or cricket, wearing a thick dogskin glove. The Prince of Wales covers his hand from sun and wind, then goes to a ball with his rosy ringers uncovered, except by rings. A young woman, on the contrary, exposes her hand to wind, and sun, and rain. She hardens it with the recklessness of a prizefighter, and when she goes to a ball, she covers it with a glove. This is not the way her predecessor belle has done in the past ages of the world. 

“The hand of a Duchess” has passed into a proverb. The old novelists always gave their heroines white hands; the poets are devoted to white hands and rosy palms. Expressive hands are, perhaps, better than pretty hands, and useful hands are better than either; but young girls who are poetry and romance combined, should not allow their hands to grow too brown and rugged. It is a strange freak of fashion, for if they were Joan of Arc and had to labor in the fields, they would look regretfully at those brown and callous hands. However, work is what you are obliged to do, and amusement, however hard, is what you choose to do, so there is all the difference in the world. As it is, however, the brown hand of an athlete is worth a dozen of the creamy hands of an idler, so we prefer the present habits of our athletic girls. If they cannot be both healthy and happy and have white hands, too, we throw up our hands. —Mrs. John Sherwood in New York World, 1887

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Etiquette and Fortunes Told

“What if you see indications in a palm that the owner of the hand will die or incur some other awful misfortune at an early date?” The lady answered that in such a case she always dissembled, and she led me to understand that it was a, matter of professional etiquette among really conscientious palmists not to make known the truth when it was of such a nature that to impart it might be dangerous.  – Reading palms, tea leaves, cards and consulting one’s planets through astrology, enjoyed great popularity as social pastimes in the last few decades of the 19th century and early decades of the 20th century. These pseudosciences, along with Tarot cards and other forms of divination, were promoted in most etiquette books from the late 1800’s. Sadly, the art of tactfully giving one’s social circle any of one’s terrible predictions of “doom and gloom” seen in the palm, a crystal ball or cards, was never mentioned.

Philosophy of Palmistry - Logic Wasted on Those Who Consult Fortune-Tellers

Last week a poor egotistical creature, who had been employed as a barmaid, drowned herself, chiefly, as would seem from her letters, on account of the sinister predictions which she read in her palm, combined with her ‘‘planets.” No doubt this girl was weak-minded, if not actually insane, but there is a good deal in her case worth thinking about, says a writer in London Truth. Some years ago, when I conducted some researches into palmistry with the assistance of a lady who claimed to be an expert in that craft, I put the question to her: “What if you see indications in a palm that the owner of the hand will die or incur some other awful misfortune at an early date?” The lady answered that in such a case she always dissembled, and she led me to understand that it was a, matter of professional etiquette among really conscientious palmists not to make known the truth when it was of such a nature that to impart it might be dangerous. 

This is all very well but no one can prevent people who dabble in palmistry or astrology or other occult means of reading the future from discovering their own fate for themselves. Those who discover by such means that the outlook for them is very black may not all commit suicide, like the unfortunate barmaid, but such knowledge is bound to have an injurious effect on all but persons of the toughest moral fibre, and persons of the toughest moral fibre, I may remark, are not in the habit of dabbling in the occult sciences. As a rule, fortune-telling in its various shapes, is chiefly denounced as a swindle and a means of obtaining money under false pretenses, but I question whether the moral mischief which may result from efforts to ascertain what the future has in store for us may not be far worse than any trifling financial loss. 

Nothing is more certain than it is to the advantage of mankind on the whole act to know the future. In saying this, I do not lose sight of the fact that it would be a profitable thing to many to know, for instance, who is going to win the next year's Derby, or the price at which any particular stock will stand at the end, of the next account. That knowledge, however, can only be profitable so long as it is in the exclusive possession of one or two individuals. If it were made accessible to all, the knowledge of the future would cease to have any more value than the knowledge of the past. On the other hand, the knowledge of the coming misfortune —if it is so preordained that it can be predicted—can only have a demoralizing effect, and on the whole, life has generally as much of the unpleasant as of the pleasant in store, for the majority of humankind. – San Diego Union News, 1899

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia 

Relaxed French Court Etiquette

Her fair Majesty always made out the list of invitations with her own hand, not allowing even the Emperor to add a single name without her permission. At these parties, the rigidity of Court etiquette was somewhat relaxed. Conversation was carried on with the utmost freedom; amusing and interesting novelties were admitted, music, tableaux vivant, private theatricals, and charades, etc., were got up by amateurs. 

The first “Grand Ball” of the season will he given at the Tuileries on Saturday next, when about 5,000 guests will be packed into the state ball-rooms, the spurs and swords of the “military” tearing the finery of the ladies’ dresses to pieces, and strewing the grounds with shreds of gauze, muslin, and tulle. Six or eight of these crowded, and not over-elegant gatherings, take place each winter, the guests being very much “mixed.” The Empress’ private balls, and the Monday evening soirées which she gives in her own private apartments are, on the contrary, very select and extremely elegant.

It is very difficult to obtain admission to these; her fair Majesty always making out the list of invitations with her own hand, and not allowing even the Emperor to add a single name without her permission. At these parties, the rigidity of Court etiquette is somewhat relaxed. Conversation is carried on with the utmost freedom; amusing and interesting novelties are admitted, music, tableaux vivant, private theatricals, charades, etc., are got up by amateurs; and the evenings, which are extremely animated and agreeable, wind up with an elegant supper. – Letter from Paris, 1865

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia