Astor: The Rise and Fall of an American Fortune

Samuel McAllister, the confidante of Caroline Astor (“Mrs. Astor”) claimed that only 400 people in New York were fit for high society. The term became shorthand for the social elite.

Historians call the period from roughly the 1870s to the 1890s the “Gilded Age.” Gilded means covered in a thin layer of gold and is meant to imply that this period looked like a Golden Age of prosperity. However, in reality, only a thin top layer of society benefited. During this era, a dramatic gap emerged between superrich businessmen benefiting from new industrialization and the disadvantaged workers in the factories and mines. The Astor family exemplified a Gilded Age fortune.

“Society” usually serves in this book (and in certain social circles) as shorthand for “high society.” Rather than referring to all people living in a city or region, it only includes the circle of rich elites who socialize together. Being accepted by “society” in this sense and determining who of the newly rich could be admitted “into society” were major preoccupations of the Astors and their peers.