Glenside Park Women, The First Generation

GLENSIDE PARK WOMEN, THE FIRST GENERATION

 

INTRODUCTION

Researching history can bring big excitement—an 1887 letter from Ella King Adams which was likely written from the Deserted Village in its Glenside Park days!  The discovery that Lydia Ackerman had a set of four watercolors of Glenside Park!

And history can bring frustration. People leave such scarce traces, and there is always a danger when making conclusions about them based on a fragmentary record.

My research into the Deserted Village has been a constant journey of discovery, with so many aha moments.

In this and some subsequent posts I intend to look more closely at women with connections to the Village as Glenside Park. I will use the context which I explored last month regarding women’s status and their expected roles in the late nineteenth century. I will also try to assess how each of the women profiled reflected class status.

I will group the women by generation or status, with the women who were adults at the onset of the resort era first, their daughters, next, and last, a post about some fascinating female guests of the later resort period. This post, then, is the first “generation.”

SOME BRIEF FURTHER CONTEXT ON CLASS IN AMERICA

On the topic of class status, I was struck by a declaration by Judith Flanders in her book The Making of Home concerning women as paid workers during the nineteenth century:

Women came into marriage as earning equals, and expected, before the Industrial Revolution, to be economically productive in their marriages as well. Even after industrialization had become widespread, this remained true for most women, the working classes always forming the majority of the population.

This reminded me of the amount of attention paid to the rise and expansion of the middle class during the nineteenth century, especially after industrialization spread. The middle class has often formed the focus for studies on changes in status and attitudes, eclipsing the growth of a working class, where status and attitudes might not dovetail with those of the middle class. As last month’s post alluded to, hiring servants was a way to establish status. Indeed, hiring servants helped give the illusion that middle class women were being sent home to idleness, a badge of their status. Of course this obscured the household duties, including managing a staff, that middle class women continued to have.

In his book, Rudeness & Civility, Manners in Nineteenth-Century Urban America, John F. Kasson indicates that “authoritative studies point to a ‘marked rise’ in economic stratifications during the first half of the nineteenth century, followed by six decades of persistent and extensive inequality from the post-Civil War period to the Great Depression of the 1930s.”¹ During this period, the more manual the labor done by a person, the lower that person’s class was.

Yet there was a great appearance, at least, of the possibility that one might make one’s fortune in America, and ascend into higher ranks of class. This coincided with a boom in publishing, and particularly of etiquette manuals.

The outpouring of books in the nineteenth century included instructional literature of many kinds. One could learn to act, build, calculate, carve, cook dance, draw, and so forth through an alphabet of attainments; so too one could through etiquette acquire the habits and knowledge that would lead to a better life. [fn in Kasson here] The existence once reserved for the gentry now appeared accessible to many social aspirants. With proper drive, knowledge, and success, an individual or family might climb the social ladder to new heights. Though the path to the summit rose precipitously and was guarded by jealous watchdogs of the upper class, middle-class members might nonetheless emulate some of its forms and manners.²

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Both men and women were ever alert to the rise and fall of the fortunes about them, and if men suffered bankruptcy (significantly often called “embarrassment” in the nineteenth century), their family’s social stock collapsed immediately.³

I will now reintroduce you to generation one of the Glenside women, all of whom have already been at least briefly introduced in past posts. I will look more closely at both some of their family history and at the traces they left behind and what that can tell us about women and status in late nineteenth century/early twentieth century New Jersey.

ELLA KING ADAMS

As I have discussed in two past posts, Introducing Ella, at https://feltvillefeatures.com/introducing-ella/, and Ella and Warren Design a Resort, at https://feltvillefeatures.com/ella-and-warren-design-a-resort/, Ella King Adams and her husband Frederic Adams were friends of Warren Ackerman’s. Warren invited the family to stay in one of the cottages in his relatively newly purchased village, Feltville, the Deserted Village. Possibly as Warren hoped would happen, Ella pressed him to turn the place into a resort. She then helped design it over the next five years. All the available evidence suggests that this five-year period was from 1884 to 1889, and that Ella brought her family to stay at the Village turned resort during those years.

In terms of family history, Ella’s father, John Stearns King, was born in Massachusetts in 1817,⁴ and her mother, Martha Stevens Messer King, was born in Vermont in 1818.⁵ The couple apparently had six or seven children before Martha died in 1858. On census records John is described as a railroad contractor (1855 census record for Seneca, New York)⁶ or simply “contractor” (1860 census record for East Orange).⁷ Those same census records place John and the family in Seneca, New York in 1850⁸ and 1855. In 1860, John and his family (minus Martha, who has already died) were living in East Orange, New Jersey. Ella was twelve at the time (although the census record has her age as 13).

The family of Ella’s future husband was also living in East Orange in 1860, but that future husband, Frederic Adams was attending college at Yale and is not actually listed in the census record for his family for that year. Obviously, he could have made visits home to East Orange, and they could have met at the time—or, if as the handwritten notation on their marriage license suggests, they may have been second cousins, and thus in touch. Sometime after the 1860 census, John Stearns King moved the family yet again, to Ohio, which is where Ella and Fred were married, in 1870, as shown in their marriage license.

A quick aside about identifying the three Frederic Adams for clarity in this post. Frederic A. Adams, whom I have referred to in my past posts as FA and will continue to so identify here, was the one who brought the Adams family to East Orange. His son, Frederic Adams was Ella’s husband, and will be referred to as Fred, mirroring how Ella referred to him in her letters. The third Frederic Adams was Ella and Fred’s youngest son, born in 1889, and will be called Freddy, a name often used in Adams family letters, to distinguish him from the other two.

ADAMS FAMILY LETTERS AND A POSSIBLE LETTER FROM GLENSIDE

As already mentioned in past posts, there is a trove of Adams family letters in the Mary Jane Means collection at the New Hampshire Historical Society, all found at https://www.nhhistory.org/object/1123086/mary-jane-means-adams-family-papers-1846-1956 and not identified with individual footnotes here.

I have, of course, already relied on things in the letters in those past posts. This time around, I have delved more fully into the letters left by Ella and close family members for clues on Ella and how she might represent or diverge from what is understood of women of her time. But first, what I believe is a discovery—all the evidence points to one of Ella’s letters being written during one of the family’s stays at Glenside Park, the resort she helped create.

The letter in question, which was my favorite from the start was written by Ella to her father in law, FA, and is dated October 24, 1887. If, as I believe, it was written from the Adams cottage at Glenside Park, Ella and family members have stayed on at the resort beyond the summer—as other guests have left evidence of doing. The letter is postmarked from the Murray Hill post office—the one closest to the village—and postmarked again for receipt in East Orange, New Jersey. It is directed to her father-in-law FA in East Orange.

Ella tells her father-in-law about how much her second daughter, Rebecca, has enjoyed her recent sixth birthday. FA had sent Rebecca a compass as a present for this birthday, which he likely meant to be used as an actual compass. Ella reports that Rebecca is wearing it on a ribbon around her neck, showing it off to people, and saying it is the prettiest compass she ever saw. I doubt that this is the use that FA intended to have the compass put to.

Possibly being even more tone deaf, Ella tells her father-in-law about Rebecca’s actual favorite birthday gift, from Aunt Ellis:

I will write to you as I wrote to Aunt Ellis last and tell you what a happy Birthday dear little Rebecca had—she never talked or thought of any think in her life as much as she has of this Birthday. A doll and a baby carriage being he one thought. Thursday night she want to sleep saying, “just to think when I wake up I shall be six years old and have my new doll and carriage. I dressed the doll in her old dolls clothes, which Priscilla had done up for her in the afternoon and put the pretty red coat and dap on her that belonged to a doll given her by Helen Merriman two years ago, they are just as nicde as ever an she certainly did look very pretty. I put her in the carriage and stood it beside her crib and in the morning she saw it the first thing when she opened her eyes—she was perfectly overjoyed—We helped her undo the carriage and every thing about it was a delight—She has note ceased playing with it—All for one moment till to day except when she ate her meals—She says she never saw any thing so pretty as the doll

Ella goes on to describe Rebecca’s birthday cake, which was a sponge cake with six candles and a wreath of sage, which plant Ella notes has not been killed by multiple frosts. Tom, identified as “one of the men” brought Rebecca a bouquet of fresh flowers from the greenhouse. I believe this was Thomas Molloy, bringing Rebecca flowers from the greenhouse which supplied Glenside Park with flowers for its renowned flower beds, and for guest bouquets.

Rebecca has gone off in the “donkey cart” with Molly to visit Katie Hart, perhaps the same donkey cart she used for the ride I reported in a previous post, when Rebecca took Aunt Helen for a wild ride. Aunt Helen is actually expected to visit soon—perhaps the visit her 1888 letter referred back to.

Ella’s two middle boys (the youngest. Freddy, has not yet been born) are trying to earn money for a “strong goat wagon.” John already has $3.00 that he earned, perhaps from a garden he had at Glenside during their summer there. He and Ellis are planning to pick and sell nuts, hopefully in nearby Summit, where Fred has discovered that nuts can be sold for $1.00 a bushel.

One of the most compelling clues that this is a stay at Glenside Park, rather than the family being in their own family house, is that Ella is homeschooling the children. Several of the other surviving letters mention the children attending school. FA, in an 1887 letter to his sister, mentions doing activities with the three middle children before they get ready for school. In a January 2, 1895 letter to Aunt Ellis, Ella mentions Ellis attending school at Newark Academy, and John going to some unspecified boarding school, but not Andover, which is the one John really wanted to attend.

So Ella and Fred generally send their children to school. Yet, in this 1887 letter to FA, Ella is conducting “my little school” every day with the three children at home (Constance never seems to be home, or makes brief visits, no matter her age). She provides details of the school to her educator father-in-law: Son Ellis is slow about spelling. John (two years younger than Ellis) and Connie (who, as noted, is actually absent, but perhaps being used as a benchmark and is four years older than John) can take many more spelling words to learn at a time. Ellis is also “slow to write figures after he reached 100 but he will improve—he learns his tables well and he reads as well as the others—and is able to keep up with them in their Geography.” Husband Fred is going to buy them a new blackboard. Ella is reading a chapter a day to the children from The Child’s Book of Nature. Fred has bought the “the new book called the Book of Worthies by Miss Yonge” and is reading it to John, probably at night Ella reports that “The book would “just suit Constance—” who, as noted, is never around.

If, indeed, the family is at Glenside Park, they seem very settled in, thinking of buying a blackboard and a goat wagon, having a vegetable garden. This is consistent with the newspaper reports I have mentioned in past posts, which speak of various Glenside Park guests closing or opening their cottages, and generally treating their cottages with something akin to ownership, regardless of the fact the cottages are rented.

ELLA AND HER TIMES

Of course, for me, it was big excitement that Ella’s 1887 letter to FA was most likely a letter from Glenside Park. I will turn back now, to what else the glimpses into her life provided by the letters might tell us about class and gender status in the late nineteenth century.

Ella clearly devotes much of her time to her family and children. Both she and Fred show a high degree of tolerance for the children engaging in outdoor activities, even after injuring themselves doing so. I will mention again the wild ride that Aunt Helen remembered Rebecca (who was either six or seven years old) took her on.

But the biggest example is “coasting,” apparently on winter hills. The January 2, 1895 letter to Aunt Ellis mentioned above letter describes the children, who are apparently currently on their school holidays, engaging in nonstop fun activities, especially coasting. Two of them have sustained injuries which would make me as a mother pause to let them go again, but Ella seems completely untroubled. Rebecca, who is about 13 or 14 years old, has badly bruised her nose, and scratched her legs and twisted herself “so that the inner muscles of her legs high up were strained and swelled—she could hardly walk.” Since then, “she went to the party last eve—she tried to dance and found she could and it really limbered her muscles and today she is better though she has not been out of doors she is unlucky.” One of the boys has also sustained some injury coasting; Ella seems no more concerned about her daughter engaging in this behavior than her sons.

A side note: the one outdoor activity by any of their children over which either parent seems to keep control is the use by John of a new double barreled gun. This gun, purchased in 1890 with Fred in New York, will, Fred hastens to tell his aunt in a letter, be only used, at least at the present, under Fred’s supervision.

In the January 2, 1895 letter, Constance is actually at home in this letter—although, with her constant attendance at social events, mostly coasting parties, she is not helping “Miss Patsy who has been here since Monday” with sewing. Constance did go to New York to get things for Miss Patsy. Apparently there are expectations on Constance, to engage in activities which are gender specific, but Ella is not pushing her.

The letters also show that Ella has sole responsibility for finding, hiring and supervising servants, of which there are several full-time ones, and others hired for specific cleaning activities, like rug cleaning. She mentions a servant named Priscilla in her 1887 letter to FA . Priscilla, one of Ella’s longest-term servants, and another servant, Susan, have left the Adams’ employ by January 1895, but Ella tells Aunt Ellis about how closely the family keeps in touch with the two. Indeed, Ella tells her aunt that she is passing on details of her current attempts to find good replacement servants to Priscilla. Priscilla and Susan have written, in turn, to tell the family that they have just returned from a trip and miss the youngest Adams child, Freddy, and Ella notes that Freddy misses them.

Ella tells her aunt more about her servant troubles in the January 2 letter, describing the confusion and dirt in her house. Ella, trying to replace the faithful Priscilla and Susan has tried out five new servants recently. Ella has also hired Hannah, who seems to be someone who comes in periodically to do washing and ironing two days of the week. Ella herself has been unable to get any mending done, because she has had to work all the time, presumably at the housework or on finding servants. The servants she has been trying out “are not nice workers and wasteful and untidy—”they made so much work for themselves they never could get ahead and hardly get the necessary work done—but I hope for a better state of things soon.”

She continues: “you would not wonder I am afraid if you could see the nicked and broken dishes, and burnt dish towels, and bags of dusters that I possess all since one week ago Monday when the girl from Newark arrived and remained one week.” . . . “Jenny Winley poor weak Jenny is coming to day to do our cooking an dining room work, and as soon as I am able possibly tomorrow I am going to start out for a colored laundress and chamber maid and with the two and a different arrangement of the work I hope to get along nicely.” Ella is looking forward also to help from Jenny, whom she clearly knows is an “excellent cook and very neat and economical and always sets the table well” and “she knows us and loves Frederic, and he likes her very much.” Ella has been glad to discover that Jenny is feeling better than she has been for two years, was looking for a position and seems glad to come work for them. Ella mentions that Jenny won’t scold as much now that Priscilla is gone, and “she never wants to go out hardly so I think she will really do better for us than any one I can find now, when no good girls seem to be out of places and really excellent girls want such high wages in spite of the poor times, Jenny is excellent and willing to come for low wages.”

Ella is also in charge of interfacing with the architect whom Ella and Fred have hired, likely to complete the new home in Summit that the family moved to a year or so before Ella’s death. As noted in a past post, the architect complimented Ella, saying she could have been an architect, and she agreed, that if she had it to do over, she would like that. Ella further declares women in general capable of such work.

Fred’s letters confirm Ella’s work with the family and household affairs, including managing the servants. In his short 1890 letter to his aunt (probably Aunt Ellis), he notes that Ella has “her hands full with the baby, for her arms are weak and he is heavy, and is rapidly learning the art of locomotion in all sorts of irregular fashions,” This is Ella’s last child, Freddy, born in 1889.

An 1895 letter from Fred mentions the family’s current “upside down condition, domestically,” naming and describing some very short lived servants who are ‘as fugitive as a Spanish Ministry.’ This reflects the troubles in finding good servants which Ella had told Aunt Ellis about. Fred says that Ella ‘seems as well as usual, though rather distracted with the confusion in the kitchen.” “Ella has been having a talk with the architect, and making some minor changes.” Apparently, Fred doesn’t know of Ella’s secret desire that she might have been an architect.

In the same letter, Rebecca has had another birthday and “is a dear little thing, a great help to her mother, and does well at School.” Constance is home, at least briefly. Both Frederic and Constance seem to be going back and forth to Orange from Summit probably to their old East Orange home which apparently is unsold; it is probably this house that Frederic says has no tenant yet and will likely remain vacant all winter.

SOCIAL DETAILS

In her January 2, 1895, letter , Ella includes some social details, including a mention of clothing–interestingly, about items the boys are wearing. John wore his tuxedo coat and the vest and trousers Mary gave him. Ella follows her description of John’s clothing with a report from Constance that John is quite popular at whatever school he has gone away to. Ella observes that he has improved, becoming more patient and quieter, and reading more—although not “first cut novels.”

Ellis wore an unreadable item of clothing from Aunt Ellis, and borrowed his father Fred’s sleeve buttons, also a present from Aunt Ellis.

Ella reports that she just got an invitation to lunch at Mrs. Skidmore with a friend of hers from South Orange, and then to go on to “the Club to hear her paper.” She is sorry, but it is impossible—but it is not clear why. Ella is going to get Mrs. Skidmore to read the paper to her at another time. Ella similarly missed a reception at the Keisons, and also a service for Mr. Henderson, who died Saturday evening, again for an unexplained reasons, but stating that of course she could not go.

In a January 25, 1895, letter, Ella gives her Aunt Ellis a quite a lot of social detail. Miss Patsy made Ella a dress which she thought very becoming. Mrs. Wilson come near the end of Miss Patsy’s time to help “as I realy needed her to run up and down, I was glad that she came as Sara & Georgie came and we needed a good deal of waiting on—Sara had to have warm milk and some thing to eat.”

Ella was glad of the visit from Sara and Georgie. Sara looks much better, but has had sleep problems, perhaps from a mild touch of grippe. The news of Georgie is very interesting—Ella spends a bit of time commenting on her appearance, remarking that Georgie is not quite as stout as the last time Ella saw her. Georgie was wearing a “pretty wine colored suit trimmed with fur and if it had fitted well would have been very becoming;” apparently it was too large, and made Georgie look larger than need be. Georgie may be unconcerned about her appearance, but is “so happy in her college life and so sure of a fellowship” and “as jolly as ever.” Georgie took a fancy to Ella’s youngest, Frederic, who is about 6. Later in the letter, Ella notes that Frederic is more quiet of late, and playing with paper dolls.

Ella is worrying, as she always is, about catching up on the mending—she needs to catch up on two weeks of mending, which is apparently one reason why she was delayed in writing to her aunt.

Mac came by with his children—he is apparently the husband of Emily, often mentioned in the letters. Emily is apparently an artist—“she has been rather used up getting into her studio and rested when she had the time.” Mac may also be an artist, as he is reporting to Ella that Emily does not like Mr. Chase, “the artist they are going to sit under.” Of course, this could be sitting for a portrait. I wonder if it is the famous artist, William Merritt Chase.

Ella tells a sad story of a “Miss Blake” who is thinking she may have to give up on “the start” she made where Ella lives, in Summit. Miss Blake appears to have been renting a place where she takes in boarders, and the boarders seem to have deserted her without paying. Mac lent her money and sold her carpets, for which he has not been paid—he is now sorry he did so, and suggested that Miss Blake could transfer ownership of furniture to him, to avoid it being taken by creditors. Ella has been in touch with one of Miss Blake’s servants, “Isabelle the girl,” who has let Ella know that Miss Blake has been quite sick.

Ella has still not settled all her servant problems and is losing a servant about whom she has reservations anyway, Rosa or Rosanna. Since Miss Blake may soom have to let Isabelle go, Ella would love to hire her if Miss Blake can no longer pay her. Ella: recognizing that Isabelle is ”quick as a wink and a fine laundress and pleasant and interested in her work” nevertheless has reservations about hiring her, since “she has to go to Orange every two weeks or so to see her children and that will be a nuisance and she is high priced beside and a good deal of a talker.” Ella notes that they “always had Priscilla to rely on.”

In a third letter from 1895, this one in February, Ella is ecstatic over a gift from her Aunt Ellis which arrived in a barrel. The letter describing the gift, a set of china from an apparently well-known store in Boston, arrives after the gift itself. After their servant Fits Patrick [sic] removes the top of the barrel, Ella is able to extract one lovely tea cup from the barrel before her son Freddy is suddenly taken with “an acute attack of indigestion,” which develops into a “seige [sic] of fever and vomiting.” The doctor has visited and reportedly pronounced indigestion the only problem. Freddy has eaten some toast, and Rebecca is reading to him. Meanwhile, Ella is “snatching” the time to write to her aunt. Ella seems still uncertain about her son’s health, calling him “bilious” and indicating that she (Ella) dares not leave him the evening of the next day to dine with Miss Mary Dinsmor.

Meanwhile, Ella’s husband Fred is just leaving for a “grand Oriental reception at the Aldine Club with Will Wiley and Mr. Mable where genuine orientals were to be present and a grand time was anticipated.”

Ella is looking forward to having her husband unpack the china set this evening—the letter must have been written over a few days, including the day of the grand Oriental reception. Ella will put the china into the corner glass closet in the dining room, having hooks installed for the cups. Rebecca, upon getting home to learn of the present from Aunt Ellis is upset that the family has not yet sent Aunt Ellis a Christmas present. Ella herself indicates that she is concerned that her aunt will be “poverty stricken” with the gifts she is giving to Ella and her family, suggesting this is one in a series of gifts—perhaps sent by Aunt Ellis for the new home Ella and Fred have just had built in Summit, the one the architect is working on.

This letter has some details about continuing issues with servants or hired help—Ella waited three weeks for someone named Mr. Hahn to wax the Parlor floors, before engaging someone else; this in turn made Rosanna have “her hands full attending to those rooms,” in turn meaning Rosanna has no attention left for Freddy, sick in bed.

She comments twice on clothing—the becoming new black coat Emily had on when she visited them on Wednesday for twenty minutes, and on Constance not acknowledging the “express package” that Ella sent her, including a “cape which I think was lovely Whether she does or not?”

LYDIA PLATT ACKERMAN—CONNECTION TO THE VILLAGE

I have also introduced Lydia Platt Ackerman, wife to Warren Ackerman, in earlier posts, although I have not supplied much detail, since she seemed only tangentially related to the Deserted Village as Glenside Park through her marriage to Warren, who owned the village.

Weirdly, Lydia actually owned the village longer than Warren did, since he died only eleven years after buying it, and she owned it for the next fourteen years until her death. After Warren’s death, an unspecified someone raised the rental fee which Thomas Molloy was required to pay to be able to manage the village as a resort, and make his family’s living therefrom. The fee went from $350 to $1200. Warren’s will gave Lydia ownership of all his real property during her lifetime, including rights to any and all income from that real property, so Lydia could have raised the rental after Warren’s death as a source of income for her living expenses.

I found one more personal clue that Lydia took some notice of Glenside Park, in the form of a set of watercolors of the village, which she left in her will to one of her closest friends.

Having connected Lydia, at least a little, to the Village, I will look at the traces she has left us.

LYDIA, THE HEIRESS

Lydia was born in 1829 in New York, and is consistently identified first as an heiress “in her own right,” and one of the children of Isaac L. Platt. Her father was one of the original directors of the Chemical Bank in New York City,⁹ which in 1996 merged with Chase Manhattan under the Chase name to become what the New York Daily News indicated was resulting in the nation’s number one bank.¹⁰

In addition to Isaac’s role in the early days of the Chemical Bank, he was “vice president of the Delaware and Hudson Canal Company when this railway was put through, also director of the Pennsylvania Coal Company, and was one of the first importers of English plate glass to this country.”¹¹ In the latter business, he fashioned the imported glass or had it fashioned under his name into items like the two “looking glasses,” which are attributed to him in the collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, described on their website thus:

In the design of this looking glass, sculptural fleur-de-lis corner brackets are accompanied by repeating Neoclassical bands and acanthus-like motifs to frame an impressive length of mirrored plate glass. In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, large glasses aided in the amplification of sun- and lamplight within a room. They were often placed either horizontally over fireplaces or vertically between windows. This looking glass, one of a pair, bears some stylistic and construction similarities to labeled examples from the shop of Isaac L. Platt, a looking-glass manufacturer and retailer active from 1815 to 1843 on Broadway in New York City.¹²

Fragments of an undated business card for Isaac’s business indeed show his business to be located at 138 Broadway, “nearly opposite the City Hotel, New York.” ¹³ Under a heading of “Looking Glass Store” Platt has listed his name and details of the products and services available, including looking glass manufacturer, print and looking glass seller, polishing, silvering and framing of looking glasses, picture glass, various kinds of thermometers, salometers, and possibly hydrometers (part of the word is ripped off), water colors, lead pencils, optic glasses and views, and other products, whose names are either obscured by age or ripped edges.

Although Platt’s short biographical sketch on the museum website indicates the years of Platt’s business as having ended in 1843, in 1855 an advertisement for his business, located now at 79 Murray Street in New York City, appeared in the Hartford Courant.¹⁴ This advertisement identifies Platt as an “importer of Polished Plate Glass, from the old established Manufactory of the BRITISH PLATE GLASS COMPANY, Raunhead, Lancashire, England. Polished Plate of all sizes, suitable for windows of stores, and dwellings, Show Casle, Coach Lamps, Rail Cars, &c., constantly on hand at the Warehouse.” The advertisement is over that of one by John R. Platt who has “taken the Agency of the above Company, is now enabled to furnish their Rough Plate Glass for Skylights, Floor-tiles and Pavements, of a quality superior to the imported article, and at much lower rates.” This appears to evidence the transfer of the company from Isaac to his son John and perhaps shows that the son was ceasing the import business, in favor of domestically produced glass products.

I have not found evidence of Lydia’s own early life. She married one of Warren’s brothers, George, in 1864, but I don’t know how she met him or where they lived. George died in 1874. Two years later, Lydia married Warren; she was 46, and he was 49. For Warren it was his first and only marriage, and he built Lydia an estate named Lyde Park in her honor.

Warren died in 1893, seventeen years into the marriage. Before his death, Lydia—as “Mrs. Warren Ackerman”—received newspaper attention a few times when she and her husband hosted or attended social events. Most notably, as noted in a previous post, “Mr. and Mrs. Warren Ackerman” are mentioned as hosting a luncheon at the Hotel Netherwood—Ella’s husband was one of the guests.

AFTER WARREN’S DEATH—LYDIA’S SOCIAL ENGAGEMENT

Seemingly, there are more reports of Lydia’s social activities after Warren’s death, all befitting her class station as an heiress and the widow of one of the area’s richest men.

On Sunday, March 21, 1897, a few years after Warren Ackerman’s death, Lydia attended a party that was reported on in the New York Daily Tribune:¹⁵

Plainfield

A “Winter Picnic” One of the Novelties of the Lenten Season—

SOCIAL GOSSIP OF INTEREST

One of the most important affairs of the week was Miss Caroline Minturn Hall’s talk on “Moliere,” together with recitations from “Le Misantrope” and “Tartuffe” at the house of Miss Rowland Cox, on Friday afternoon. Miss Hall is the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. David Prescott Hall, of this city, and the granddaughter of Mrs. Julia Ward Howe. Her many friends awaited with interest her series of drawing-room talks and recitations, of which the following women are patronesses: Mrs. Warren Ackerman, Mrs. Marion S. Ackerman, Mrs. John T. Baker, Mrs. Rowland Cox, Mrs. Clapp, Mrs. Samuel Huntingon, Miss Kenyon, Mrs. Robert Lowry, Mrs. Charles W. McCutchen, Mrs. John Doull Miller, Mrs. Lawrence Myers, Mrs. David W. Pond, Miss Tweedy, Mrs. Orville T. Waring, and Mrs. Francis Wood. The readings were in every way a pleasurable entertainment to all who attended.

Note that Lydia was one of the patronesses of this series. This was not her only example of philanthropy—Lydia also donated money both to the Scotch Plains Public Library¹⁶ and to the Fresh Air Fund, an organization which brought poor children out from cities to the country during the summer.¹⁷ The amount of the donation to the library is not specified, but it should be noted that the donations to the Fresh Air Fund were $25 in 1903, and $20 in 1906. However, there were few donations in excess of the amount Lydia was offering, with the top amount being either $100 or $115 in each year.

It is not clear whether Lydia was involved in the Fresh Air Fund beyond a donation, but on the event of Lydia’s death, a meeting concerning the Fresh Air Camp was moved from the house of Mrs. Marion S. Ackerman, wife of Warren’s nephew, who was one of his executors, to Truell Inn, with Lydia’s death being the reason for the move.¹⁸ The meeting, as moved, included remarks by Rev. Dr. Rodman, who was “president of the association.”¹⁹ The matron of the Home where the children spent part of their summer spoke and had some of the children recite and sing “much to the pleasure of the audience.” There were also musical numbers performed by Miss Cornelia Hyatt and Miss Mary Hubbell.

Lydia had at least two short mentions in Plainfield newspapers in 1897, when in September her “valuable fox terrier” was found “shot out of spite,”²⁰ and again in November, when she was “spending a few weeks in New York while her Scotch Plains residence is being altered and repaired for the winter.”²¹

In 1901, Lydia attended a dinner party in honor of the impending wedding of her namesake, Lydia Platt Ackerman, daughter of Warren’s brother, James Hervey Ackerman, who was also the father of two of Warren’s executors, Ernest R. Ackerman and Marion S. Ackerman. Presumably the elder Lydia also attended her niece’s wedding, although I have not found the newspaper account of the wedding. In 1902, Lydia herself threw a birthday dinner:

	ELABORATE BIRTHDAY DINNER Mrs. Susan Cole Stout Observes her Eighty- fifty [sic] Anniversary as Guest of Mrs. Warren Ackerman
	Mrs. Warren Ackerman, of Lyde Park, Scotch plains, on Saturday gave An elaborate dinner in commemora- tion of the eighty-fifth birthday of Mrs. Susan Coles Stout. Mrs. Stout is the widow of Jared S. Stout, is the only surviving sister of the late Dr. Abraham Coles, and resides at Scotch Plains, in the memorable colonial Homestead built by her father, Dennis Coles. Mrs. Stout, Warren Ackerman and Dr. Coles were largely responsi- ble for the erection of the beautiful gothic brick church at Scotch Plains. Mrs. Stout, although in her eighty- sixth years, [sic?] retains all her facut- ties, is bright and happy, and as the gurest of honor, was very en’ tertaining in relating of the incidents connected with the early history of Scotch Plains. Mrs. Ackerman, has always proved herself a charming hostess. The guests found her cozy, picturesque cottage profusely décor- ated with choice flowers and plants from her conservatories and gournds. The birthday cake, ordered for the occasion, was furnished by Marest, of New York.22

LYDIA EXERCISES HER RIGHTS

I have already detailed how Warren wrote his will to give Lydia ownership of and control over all his extensive real property during her lifetime. As the items above show, Lydia was not shy about making changes to her home after her death, and her sole ownership of the home was simply a given. She also seems to have actively employed her rights to the rest of Warren’s real estate.

In various notices on behalf of the Estate of Warren Ackerman, Deceased, Lydia is identified as Lydia P. Ackerman, not Mrs. Warren Ackerman and heads the list of executors giving notice to possible creditors of the estate that they have a limited time to make any claims against the estate. Lydia engages in real estate transactions on numerous occasions, although an “et al.” is appended after her name on some occasions, which may suggest some level of involvement by unspecified others.

In terms of evidence of Lydia’s real estate transactions, one of the most intriguing sources is an Index of Deeds for Union County, NJ, for the years from 1885 to 1905. Both Lydia and Warren Ackerman are listed as joint grantors on 21 land transactions made before Warren’s death, in 1893. But both Lydia and Warren continue to be listed as the deed grantors for all but one of eleven transfers after Warren’s death—and the eleventh is probably meant to include Warren’s name, too. For a 1904 transfer of property to one Alvah W. Ten Eyck, there is both an entry on the Index of Deeds, and in a confirming newspaper announcement of the transfer.²³

In 1902, Lydia “et als.” [sic] filed a writ of fieri facias against Adeline P. Robinson, apparently the executrix for someone’s estate, seeking the forced sale of a piece of property to satisfy an outstanding debt, and the Chancery Court ordered a sheriff’s sale of the property.²⁴ So, maybe Lydia could even be ruthless.

LYDIA’S WILL

Some of the most interesting clues to Lydia’s character and role as a wealthy and self-assured woman of her time, come from her will. Lydia made and remade her will a number of times after Warren’s death. I believe the version I found on FamilySearch to be the last one before her death in 1907, since it is prefaced with several pages referencing its probate. It also seems to include some short codicil provisions, which apparently change some of the bequests to some extent, but mostly are very confusing.

Lydia’s will is notable for the number of beneficiaries, particularly compared to Warren’s will, which confined its beneficiaries to Lydia and to his own siblings and his nephews and nieces, that is, those in the Ackerman line. Lydia’s will does include the Ackerman nephews and nieces, but in a mostly more limited fashion. Of course, all the Ackerman heirs were still waiting for the final resolution of Warren’s estate and the distribution thereof, which they knew would give them far more inheritance than Lydia’s will could provide. The final resolution of Warren’s will was not to happen for another twelve years beyond Lydia’s death.

Lydia gives money bequests to two of three close friends, one of whom is apparently now living with Lydia, who gets a straight $5000 and half of another $5000, that the friend shares with one of the other two. An included codicil may changed this afterwards to shares in $10,000, with some complicated conditions should one predecease the other. In my mind, the third friend gets the most valuable bequest, four watercolors of Glenside Park! And the writing desk in Lydia’s dressing room. All three friends are also to get keepsakes—tokens of Lydia’s remembrance, apparently to be selected for them by nieces on Lydia’s side of the family.

Some other women, whose relationship to Lydia is generally not identified, also get bequests—many of these are single women, as denoted by “Miss.” One such woman, Miss Caroline Wright, gets $10,000 and a life estate in the house in which she is living at the time, opposite the Episcopal Church—although it appears that Lydia later changed the money gift from a straight $10,000 to an annuity of $500 per annum for her lifetime, and may have changed this yet again, so that Caroline got (up to) eight payments of $500, during her lifetime. Katie Wadick, whose name is not prefaced with a Miss or Mrs., and is identified as “now living with me,” is given $5,000. Lydia’s niece Lydia Ackerman Platt, who was named after Lydia, also gets $5,000. One female cousin gets $10,000.

Weirdly, two of Warren’s sisters get to share $50,000—one of Lydia’s bigger monetary bequests. Lydia’s former pastor, Reverend Kneeland Platt Ketcham, receives $10,000.

Lydia’s will has specific bequests for several of the servants in her employ—Warren’s does not mention any servants. Simon P. Debbie receives $10,000, “in recognition of his faithful services for many years to my husband and myself.” James H. Walker, Lydia’s coachman and “one Schreiner, my gardener,” each are to receive $1000. Any other male employee who has been in Lydia’s employ for at least a year before her death gets $100—which probably means that some of the female beneficiaries for whom no relationship is specified are in service in the home. Were her male servants too numerous to list?

Lydia is incredibly precise and detailed on what happens to any of these bequests if the intended recipient predeceases her, specifying the alternate beneficiaries by name and even going so far as to name next level beneficiaries should the first alternate also predecease her. Warren had much more general language in his will.

Warren’s three living nephews, three of the executors of his will, Dr. J.A. Coles, Ernest R. Ackerman, and Marion S. Ackerman receive “all the horses, harnesses and carriages with their equipments, and all cows and mules, and greenhouse plants, and all farming implements . . . to be divided between them, share and share alike.” I like to visualize the three somewhat aristocratic nephews squabbling over the farm implements. All the Ackerman heirs get to share the furniture contained in Lyde Park, except for a rather large number of bequests of specific items. But these Ackerman heirs do not get any statuary, paintings, plates, bric a brac, personal apparel, jewelry or books—all these items, except for any specifically mentioned, go to the nieces on Lydia’s side of the family. As to the books, in particular, the three Ackerman nephews get any books previously owned by Warren, but the nephews on Lydia’s side of the family get all the remainder of the books in the library—which may suggest Lydia was a serious book collector, or it may amount to only a few.

In Lydia’s estate, and the subject of a specific bequest to Dr. J.A. Coles is a “large writing desk which was Uncle George Ackerman’s”—Lydia’s first husband, and something she clearly inherited when he died. Emilie S. Coles, J.A.’s sister, gets Lydia’s pearls, which were a gift from the same “Uncle George,” “and also, my table.”

Lydia especially singles out her nephew, Furman Platt, son of her brother Samuel, to receive income from the residue and remainder of her estate (after specific bequests) during his lifetime. Even the house which Lydia is allowing Miss Caroline Wright the use of during her life will go into the rest and residue to produce income for Furman. This rest and residue is to be divided between all of Lydia’s nephews and nieces, on her side of the family, after Furman’s death.

Lydia’s obituary indicates that Furman “was constantly with her during her last illness.”²⁵ The obituary appears on page 8 of the same newspaper Warren’s appeared in, his, some fourteen years before, was on page one. Lydia is apparently not quite as compelling news.

ANNIE

The third woman of this generation of Village women, Annie Molloy, is the most intimately involved with Glenside Park, since she, along with her husband Thomas, operated the resort for more than a decade. I am sad to say she will have the shortest section here, since she neither left letters or a will nor did she get attention in the newspaper.

I have explored Annie’s early life in past posts. Twelve-year-old Annie arrived in America from Ireland, apparently in1858, probably at the same time as her mother Mary Hoyne. No information is available on Annie’s father, presumably left behind in Ireland. Annie is already in domestic service at the age of 14, providing child care in the Newark household of Edward and Harriet Parker.

Annie married Civil War veteran John Steinbauer when she was 30, in 1866. Family stories passed down suggest that John, who was receiving an “invalid pension” at time of his death needed constant care, and Annie secured a domestic post which allowed the two of them a place to live in, so that Annie could care for John as well as work. John’s death occurred in1873, and Annie applied for a widow’s continuation of the invalid pension John had been receiving as a result of wounds during the Civil War after his death.

Annie was still in domestic service of some kind when she married her second husband, and the father of her only child, several years later. In the 1880 census she is listed as a housewife, the only time she seems not to have worked. Four years later, she arrived at the Village with Thomas and their daughter, Anna, and Annie worked running the kitchen from that time on.

SOCIAL NOTE ABOUT ANNIE?

I have found only one newspaper social notice about Annie, as Mrs. Thomas Molloy:

(special Correspondence of The [Plainfield Daily]Press)

Scotch Plains, Oct. 27.—Mr. and Mrs. Molloy, of Glenside, entertained a number of their friends at their home at Glenside Park last evening. Dancing was the feature of the evening, after which the hostess furnished a collation. Friends were present form New Brunswick, Plainfield, Summit and Scotch Plains. Mr. and Mrs. [sic, see below]²⁶ Molloy leave shortly for a European trip. The evening’s pleasure was arranged by their daughter, Miss Mamie, as a bon voyage gathering of their many friends.

This article contains multiple mistakes, which makes me believe that the author somehow did not consider it important enough to get it right. It was actually Miss Mamie who threw the party. Miss Mamie Walsh was best friend to the Molloys’ daughter Anna and sister to the man Anna would eventually marry. Moreover Mrs. Molloy was not the one going on the trip—it was her daughter, Anna. So, Annie’s only newspaper appearance seems to have simply been a mistake.

SOME REFLECTIONS ON THE THREE WOMEN

Ella has left us the most personal and extensive record, and even, I believe, a letter written from her Glenside Park Cottage. Ella shows herself to be a woman who accepts her role as chief caretaker for the family, even to the extent of conducting her little school when the children are away from their regular schools. Ella is always worrying about catching up on her mending and letter writing, and sometimes about neglecting little Freddy, who is younger enough that he gets left on his own, especially after Priscilla departs.

Ella clearly has a sense of class distinctions—Tom is, after all, simply “one of the men,” rather than the manager for Glenside Park I believe him to be. Priscilla and Susan are beloved servants, and the family continues to have a relationship with them even after they leave their employ, and to value how much Ella’s children, especially Freddy love and miss them.

Ella wants good servants who won’t be breaking her dishes and will work efficiently, but she wants them not to ask too much in wages or to need to go visit their own families too often.

Ella tells Aunt Ellis that she is smart enough, and women are smart enough, for professions like architecture, but she apologizes to FA in at least one letter about her mistakes writing the letter, and notes that she restarted the letter numerous times. FA, of course, was the consummate educator, and her father-in-law, and she may have felt more self-conscious about her abilities with him than with Aunt Ellis. Interestingly, FA mentions Ella’s quick mindedness, although it is in the context of something about a dance and dance attire, so he may simply be suggesting that as a woman, Ella has a better understanding of such things.

Comparing Ella and Lydia, I would conclude that Lydia was upper class, and Ella was upper middle class. I really doubt that Lydia was ever worried about catching up on her mending, or even her letter writing. She seems to have a strong sense of her place in the world.

Ella’s self-reported social engagements seem to be almost exclusively making and receiving visits, with one mention of a women’s club she is apparently involved in, . Interestingly, she is not mentioned as a guest at the luncheon Warren and Lydia threw at the Netherwood, which Ella’s husband attended.

Lydia supported charities and at least the one literary series; Ella doesn’t mention philanthropy. But Lydia, just like Warren, does not leave anything to charity in her will. Warren received some support from this choice in the newspaper, in response to “gossiping critics,” apparently people did not gossip about Lydia in the same way.

Annie is very clearly working class, one of those multitudes of women whom Judith Flanders indicated expected to work both before and after their marriage. Her great granddaughters deemed her daughter, Anna, their grandmother, to have “married above her class,” but Annie is not thought to have transcended working class.

NEXT MONTH

As with all my posts, I work my way to some understanding of the history represented through the Deserted Village on paper, through writing. I feel I am probably still too immersed in the weeds of the records the three women left to really see the bigger picture they represent, so as I work through the other posts on women, you can expect to see some conclusions materialize.

Next month, I will turn to some material culture history that I have begun to realize the Village represents, which will give me time to do the research that each of the women I have chosen requires.

Until then!