My Dear Alice
Chapter 5: 1892 & 1893 – On the Go
(photography / travel / athletics / dashed plans)
Image attributions: (HRT) Historic Richmond Town archive; (AAH) Alice Austen House Museum collection.
1892 Bessie Strong & Jack Van Dyke
Strong often mentions her cousin Jack Van Dyke, an art historian who taught at Rutgers University and gave public lectures to audiences upwards of 1,000 people. The emulsion peeled from the glass plate. (HRT)
1892 Mr. Hopper
Photographed by Alice Austen at Watkins Glen, NY. (HRT)
1892 View from Clear Comfort with Violet & Trude
Clear Comfort was visible to passing vessels, which Austen photographed for many decades. This image shows a camera on a tripod, a telescope, and Violet Ward & Trude Eccleston viewing the passing boats. (HRT)
1894 Camera Mosaics journal
The journal published American Camera Club photographs. (AAH)
1894 Austen’s photos in the Camera Mosaics journal
An uncharacteristic set of Austen’s photographs. (AAH)
1894 Austen’s photos in the Camera Mosaics journal
Images from the 1892 canal trip and summer resorts. (AAH)
1891 letter from Violet Ward
1891 Letter from Bessie Strong
Strong would sometimes obscure her own writing by writing over it, making for challenging transcription. (AAH)
1892 Letter from Ralph Munroe
Munroe wrote from the yacht Wabun, filling in Alice on their activities since her departure. (AAH)
1892 Canal Trip aboard the yacht Wabun
1892 Butterball and Nellie Austen
Aboard the yacht Wabun (HRT)
1892 view of the yacht Wabun
Alice Austen print of scene from the canal trip. (AAH)
1892 Canal trip
Alice Austen blowing into a conch shell, earning her the nickname “Gabriel” the biblical horn blower. Austen nicknamed Thomas Brown (pictured in Harvard sweater) Butterball. (HRT)
1892 the yacht Wabun in a narrow passage
1893 Daisy Elliott at the Berkeley Ladies Athletic Club
Daisy Elliott demonstrating an early athletic pose as described in the narrative. Carrie Ward on the mat at left, her sister Violet seated next to her. (HRT)
1893 Daisy Elliott & Violet Ward in the Berkeley Gymnasium
Daisy Elliot hangs, demonstrating her athletic prowess. (HRT)
1893 Daisy Elliott and a group at the Berkeley Gymnasium
Daisy Elliott on rings; Violet Ward holding football at left; Carrie Ward to right of Daisy. (HRT)
1893 Daisy Elliott
1893 Violet Ward
1893 Carrie Ward
1893 Violet Ward, Daisy Elliott, and Caroline Lawrence
At the Berkeley Gymnasium. (AAH)
1893 Alice Austen prepares to leave for Chicago’s Columbian Exposition
Austen poses with her pug, Punch, at the front of Clear Comfort. (HRT)
1893 Ferris Wheel at Chicago’s Columbian Exposition
A rare view of the Ferris Wheel. Austen stayed on campus at the University of Chicago, from which this photo appears to have been taken. (AAH)
1893 Statue of the Republic at Chicago’s Columbian Exposition
Austen copyrighted 25 of her World’s Fair photographs. (HRT)
1893 Statue of Columbus at Chicago’s Columbian Exposition
A very rare view of Chicago’s Lake Park (now Grant Park) and Columbus statue during the 1893 World’s Fair. (HRT)
1893 Alice Austen copyrighted photos from the Chicago World’s Fair
Card from the U.S. Copyright Office.
1893 letter from Henry K. Gilman at The Players Club in Gramercy Park
Gilman wrote to Austen at Chicago during the Columbian Exposition. (AAH)
1893 letter from Austen’s mother to Alice at Lake George
She tells of a big storm that ravaged Clear Comfort – as presented in this episode. (AAH)
1893 Trude Eccleston and reflection at Lake George
Austen posed Trude Eccleston to obscure her face with her hat, while reflecting it in the rock’s puddle. (HRT)
1893 Violet Ward’s Bodkin patent excerpt
1892 Poker game with Mr. Gilman (left), Julie Bredt, and G. Wildrick
This is the only photo in the archive that shows Henry K. Gilman. (HRT)
1892 negative sleeve of Poker game with Henry Gilman & Julie Bredt
Austen referred to Henry Gilman as Mr. Gilman, and she was Miss Austen to the end. (AAH)
Opening music …
[Bessie Strong]
My Dear Alice,
“Many happy returns of the day” to you and St Patrick. With this I send you three photographs. Two of them I am quite ashamed of, but as I had no others ready and wanted them to go at once, I concluded to send them with an apology. I do not like them, but there has been no time since Monday to do any others. So please accept these with my love, and trust to getting some better specimens one of these days.
Have not heard from you in an age, but as I am becoming a poor correspondent myself, perhaps I had better not say much.
Mother joins me in love and best wishes,
Always affectionately, Elisabeth B. Strong
+++++++
[Narrator]
I’m Pamela Bannos in collaboration with the Alice Austen House Museum, and this is My Dear Alice, a podcast series that explores the life of photographer Alice Austen through her photographs and these letters that were discovered decades after her death. You’ll find images of some of these letters, along with photographs referred to here at the website that accompanies this podcast. That’s My Dear Alice dot ORG.
Chapter 5:
In the early 1890s, when photography’s popularity mixed with festive parties and outdoor recreation and people began performing for the camera and joining camera clubs to share, exhibit, and win prizes for their efforts, several of Alice’s friends and acquaintances also shared her enthusiasm for the medium. But none of them had quite the passion – or by the evidence – the skill and talent that she had. Austen’s photos show a technical prowess and aesthetic sensibility that stand out, even among other published photographs of the time. In 1894, ten of her photos would appear in the journal, Camera Mosaics, billed as “A Portfolio of National Photography – a collection of Camera Club Photos.” There were no galleries or exhibition opportunities outside of the Camera Club exhibitions – Alice belonged to the Jersey City Camera Club and her Uncle Peter, a chemistry professor at Rutgers University, was the president of the New Brunswick Camera Club.
Violet Ward is often holding a camera in Alice’s photos of her, and the loquacious Bessie Strong often shared her photographic escapades:
[Bessie Strong]
I wish you could see some of the photographs I took last Tuesday. Eleven in one afternoon. My “Rogues Gallery” is going to be a work of art.
[Narrator]
Here’s Julia Martin:
[Julia Martin]
I am awfully sorry my picture faded out. We thought it was a very good likeness. Mrs Snively would take very good photographs if she had the patience to wait for proper development; but she is in such a hurry, she never takes time and it is a wonder she gets any result at all.
[Narrator]
Earlier, Violet had written from Washington DC:
[Violet Ward]
Dear Alice,
The top of the morning to you these fine days, and may you not rest in tranquility until Ash Wednesday.
Here I am with my Aunt to enjoy all the delights of the Capitol. I only wish you were along,
what fun we would have together.
My camera is here, and I hope to take back some work with me. Undeveloped of course.
Did you succeed in securing some snow plates this year? What opportunities you must have had with this season of cold.
There are no end of things to take here.
Send me a line to learn of the absent ones. Where is Julia Martin all this time? And why don’t she look me up in New York?
Think I am to have a 6-by-8 camera and want you to come and spook round with me, looking up the right thing
when I return to New York.
With kindest regards to your mother.
Ever thine, Violet M.E. Ward
+++++++++++
[Narrator]
In October 1892, Alice joined her Aunt Nellie, Nellie’s older brother Ralph Munroe, and another man, Thomas Brown, on an adventurous excursion that took them 185 miles by boat from New Brunswick, New Jersey, to Annapolis, Maryland. Sailing for ten days on a two masted sloop designed by Munroe, and called The Wabun, which was the name for the east wind from Longfellow’s Hiawatha, the foursome alternately sailed wide rivers and were pulled through narrow canals. In Alice’s photographs of the event, we see the older, bearded Munroe and Brown, who wore a Harvard sweater in all the pictures. Alice nicknamed the physically fit Brown, Butterball, as he is noted on all her negative sleeves. It may have been because of his appetite – they were the same age. The playfulness is striking in contrast to Henry Gilman’s one-sided formality.
After Alice and Nellie disembarked at Annapolis, the men continued on to Biscayne Bay, Florida, where the yacht had originated. Five years earlier, Munroe had purchased 40 acres in Coconut Grove. The home he would soon build there remains as the oldest standing house in Dade County and is now part of Barnacle Historic State Park.
Ralph Munroe is best known today as a designer of more than 50 sailing yachts, but he was also a serious photographer. Years earlier, Alice’s mother wrote he had been photographing Clear Comfort:
[Alice Cornell Austen]
Ralph’s new photos of the house are very pretty, indeed.
[Narrator]
Fifteen years older than Alice, Ralph Munroe was clearly taken with her. He took her seriously as an individual and also as a photographer. After she and Nellie left the sailing excursion, and while still on the vessel, the widowed Munroe wrote Alice a 1000-word missive.
[Ralph Munroe]
Aboard the Yacht Wabun, 8.30pm November 26th, 1892
My dear Alice,
We have just had supper, (Corned beef hash, rice cakes & tea) & Butterball’s life is saved for we had gone two hours past the regular mealtime in order to make a harbor & save all of the ebb tides towards Tyler, and his condition was critical.
I was delighted to get your nice long letter at Charleston in company with a jolly one from Nellie. I wrote you from Southport North Carolina when we had the pleasure of doing the town and getting acquainted with pretty nearly everyone in it. Almost a week was fooled away there. We made our start out …
[Narrator]
He went on to describe, in detail, the weather and how it affected their travel – including how they had outrun a hurricane. And he went on…
[Ralph Munroe]
Went ashore, took a walk in the pine woods, called on some of the farmers, picked some peanuts & concluded we were lucky chaps.
[Narrator]
He described towns where they stopped along the way, as well as their preparations for Thanksgiving Dinner:
[Ralph Munroe]
Charleston is always an interesting place for me. So many quaint old buildings & objects & I should like some time to spend a week or so there. Butterball was especially desirous to linger but the detention at Bogue & Southport had made sad inroads into our allotted time. So next morning, Butterball went looking up films & maps & Joe & I went marketing for our Thanksgiving dinner: Turkey, cranberries, & plum pudding, & by 9:30 we were off again through the inside passage of Beaufort.
[Narrator]
He went into greater detail on the components of their dinner, and then launched into a weird dream he had about Alice, and which give us another glimpse into her character as others experienced her:
[Ralph Munroe]
String beans, carrots, & a bottle of Claret completed the feast which we got away with in good shape & then turned in to dream; in my case, of things delightful in the extreme. One of the events of the night being a stroll on some beach with you & witnessing the landing of pirates in canoes after the manner of Captain Kidd in the last century. One of the gents had a finger growing from his nose and you got very much provoked with me because I did not call them all by name & introduce you. Explanations on my part as to my never having met the gentlemen before being of no avail. Hope you have forgiven me by this time.
[Narrator]
He went on in detail about the next day’s adventures, the weather and Butterball’s travails at photographing and running out of film – which were individual glass plates:
[Ralph Munroe]
You would enjoy this part of our trip, I know; but the number of plates required would be something awful. Poor Butterball hasn’t any. Fired at everything in sight expecting a supply at Charleston, but they had not arrived & he could not buy any.
Good night.
[Narrator]
Continuing his writing for two more days, he ended his letter with an invitation:
[Ralph Munroe]
You must take the Sea Island trip some time but earlier in the season. We will figure it out somehow. My next address I hope will be Cocoanut Grove, Dade Co. Florida. Give my best regards to the family.
Sincerely yours, Ralph
Arrived here at 5 am this morning. Slight frost.
+++++++++++
[Narrator]
In the meanwhile, Alice was back spending time with Violet Ward, who had introduced her to Daisy Elliot, the director of the gymnasium at the Berkeley Ladies Athletic Club in Manhattan. The Club just had their 4th annual open exhibition, which consisted of
[Reporter]
“…marching and calisthenics and dumbbell work, and the work at the weights and swingings and twistings and gyrations on horizontal bars, parallel bars, trapezes and flying rings…”
[Narrator]
Daisy Elliot, who was nine years older than Alice, was among the earliest American women who identified as an athlete. A newspaper article from 1889, reporting on a summer course in physical training at Harvard, in which women from across the country participated, illustrates Daisy’s prowess:
[Reporter]
“Miss Elliott took the prizes in dumbbell, club swinging, vaulting and climbing exercises. She went up a long rope extended from the ceiling hand over hand like a sailor, clean to the top, winning great applause.”
[Narrator]
The 5-foot-2 Elliot was bad-ass. She never smiles in photographs, taking physical fitness – and herself – very seriously. In one of Alice Austen’s photographs of a small group of women in the Berkeley Gymnasium, including Violet and Carrie Ward, Daisy Elliott stands on a tall platform, one knee forward resembling a yoga warrior stance, the skylight spot-lighting her. She poses dramatically in her voluminous bloomers, pointing toward the upper corner of the photo – the other women sit casually on floor mats, deep in shadow.
An even earlier newspaper article sheds some light on Daisy’s pose.
Here’s an excerpt from a report on the 1887 showcase at the Adelphi Academy in Brooklyn:
[Reporter]
“The next number on the program was received with rapturous applause. Led by Miss Elliott, the young women assumed various graceful and picturesque poses. First, they stood with folded arms; then, after appearing to point out some intensely interesting object miles and miles away, they put up their arm as though shielding off some deadly sword stroke; then they assumed attitudes which appeared pantomimically to picture defiance, abhorrence, beseeching and prayer.”
[Narrator]
I’m not sure what any of this had to do with athletic prowess, but Daisy’s pose for Alice’s camera captured her mastery, still effective six years later.
+++++++++++
By the middle of 1893, Alice’s friends’ thoughts were on Chicago’s Columbian Exposition. Some were making plans to go, and others were lamenting that they couldn’t. In mid-June, while Alice was visiting her Aunt Nellie and Uncle Pete in New Brunswick, she was invited to go to Chicago with Effie Emmons’s family. Soon thereafter, she heard from Trudie:
[Trude Eccleston]
How perfectly lovely it is for you to be able to go to Chicago with Mrs. Emmons – you are a very lucky girl, but I must say they have picked out a very hot time to go. Why, you will die with the heat. They say it is frightful there now. You must make time to tell me all about your good times, past and to come.
I live on ice cream and lemonade these days. Remember Me to your aunt with lots of love. Trude Eccleston
[Narrator]
The next day, Henry Gilman wrote:
[Henry K. Gilman]
Dear Miss Austen.
I am delighted to learn by your note this morning of your good fortune in regard to going to Chicago. My only regret is that some way could not be arranged so that you could go with us.
But I don’t doubt you will thoroughly enjoy it. All the accounts I have heard agree that it is worth almost any sacrifice.
[Narrator]
Alice left for Chicago on July 1st, and Mr. Gilman wrote again a few days later, lamenting over the lovely moonlit nights he was missing – and also acknowledging how difficult it was to have a late evening with Alice in her Rosebank neighborhood on Staten Island:
[Henry K. Gilman]
Dear Miss Austen.
I meant to send you a line with the photos but found I had no letter paper at the office – forgot to get some Friday; and so postponed writing until today, hoping I should hear from you with your Chicago address.
Please don’t aggravate me by prating of your lovely moonlight nights. I am just dying for one on your piazza with the moonlight on the water and all. – I don’t know how I shall get it unless I find a boarding place in Rosebank and take up a residence there for a few weeks.
Today I suppose you are enjoying the fair – I wish I were there – If I could get a pass I would run out even if only for a day — I have a good mind to do it, as it is.
[Narrator]
And she heard again from Trudie:
[Trude Eccleston]
My dearest Alice;,
I was so glad to hear from you & think you are a brick to find time to write me. What a lovely time you are having. Mrs. Emmons seems like almost as much of a fiend as you are at seeing things. I don’t believe there will be anything left for you to see when you get through. That is a very Irish way of putting things, but it is just what I mean.
My! What a lot. I shall take two days off, for I mean to hear about everything you both have seen & done. That is the privilege of a stay-at-home lady like myself.
I have done very little since you left, but slave, nearly every morning. Mother & I devote to sewing, I am helping her finish off her things as well as my own. Our plans at present are to go to Lake George the last two weeks in August & the first in September.
I played croquet with Effie at the Clifton Club on Saturday – all the dirt courts are now in full play.
[Narrator]
And then she heard again from Henry Gilman:
[Henry K. Gilman]
Dear Miss Austen –
I was delighted to receive your letter this morning. Of course, you are having a beautiful time – how could you help it. I wish I were there to enjoy the music.
From present appearances I shall have four female relatives to look after without other male assistance when we go; so that I fear I shall not have what is vulgarly known as a “picnic.” However, they are all persons who are abundantly able to look after themselves, if need be, so perhaps I am borrowing trouble.
I am glad you are coming home so soon. Shall I have the pleasure of seeing you on say Tuesday evening the 18th? Drop me a note or a telegram and name some other night if that doesn’t suit.
Hastily, yours, HKG
[Narrator]
Austen was gone for two weeks, returning in the middle of July.
Julia Martin, who had been writing regularly, learned that Alice had returned home from Bennington, Vermont.
[Julia Martin]
Dear Alice:
I see by the paper that you have returned from Chicago and I am waiting to hear your account. I know you must have been perfectly delighted. Miss Sanford, you remember her: she is quite masculine & lives in the summer in the yellow house near Mrs Cooper’s. She takes photographs. Well she said she would never forget the sights of those huge buildings.
I am going to the Adirondacks on Saturday with Mrs. Wellington, her mother & a Miss Wellington for ten days. I will be fourteen miles from anywhere & I expect to sleep, drink milk & get some flesh on my bones.
[Narrator]
In a couple of weeks, Alice would also be in the Adirondacks. She stayed with Trude Eccleston’s family at Lake George. A New York Times article reported that Alice and Trudie won 2nd place in doubles in the canoe sailing race. Her photographs include light hearted pictures of others rowing long canoes and posed groups of smiling people.
As often seemed to be the case, Henry Gilman’s words to Alice present a stark contrast:
[Henry K. Gilman]
Dear Miss Austen,
I was very glad to get your letter several days ago.
I have left it unanswered solely for the reason that I have been so blue & worried & generally out of sorts that I had no wish to inflict myself on anyone.
I have done nothing interesting – have been nowhere except to Bayhead for a Sunday or two and have spent all my spare time on our own piazza with a pipe and doleful thoughts for companions.
As to the World’s Fair – I have serious doubts whether I will be able to go at all.
If business conditions don’t change pretty soon, I don’t see how I can get away at all. I have neither had quite so hard & worrying a time as in the last five or six weeks – If it lasts much longer, I think the top of my head will fly off.
Everybody has been away from Flushing & it is duller than I ever saw it. Please write me again unless you are afraid of getting another stupid letter.
I am sorry I can’t write more clearly, but I really don’t feel it.
Yours as always HKG
[Narrator]
The next week Alice’s mother wrote of a great storm that likely also affected Mr. Gilman’s mood:
[Alice Cornell Austen]
My dearest Lollie,
I hope the storm we had here last night did not reach Lake George, for it was most violent. The wind was tremendous, and the old house fairly rocked with it. The rain came down with a rush inside our window. I had to get up in the night and place the usual basin, which was overflowing this morning. The Captain was up at 2 o’clock carrying in the plants from the roof, they were being blown about in all directions, then he had to go to the middle room for a rope to tie on the awning which threatened to fly off altogether. He had on this long India rubber coat as if he was at sea. The waves dashed quite over the bulkhead, gullied out the corner, went to Ives, and this morning the grass below is coated with refuse, sticks, straw, etc.. No end of branches are broken from the trees and the vines are badly whipped.
+++++++
[Narrator]
Clear Comfort, the Austen family home, with its enviable waterfront location, also made it vulnerable to the elements and sometimes difficult to visit. The busy lives of Alice’s friends, compounded by Staten Island’s somewhat challenging travel route, led to plans being made and broken. In June, Bessie Strong wrote:
[Bessie Strong]
I hear you want a visit from me this summer. Shall be delighted to, provided we can agree upon the time. You must arrange to come here also.
[Narrator]
But she never made the trip:
[Bessie Strong]
It seems to be decreed that I shall never get to Rosebank anymore, certainly not on Monday, much as I should like to.
It is very kind of you to ask me over, and if you still want me two or three weeks hence, provided no more company turns up, I may be able to come. But it is all doubtful, and if you have other plans, please say so frankly.
Mother joins me in love. Thank you ever so much for your kind invitation, but you see, I cannot come now.
Yours, Elisabeth B Strong
How is Mr Gilman? I hear he is all devotions still.
[Narrator]
Two days after Bessie asked about Henry Gilman, he also wrote Alice with regrets that he couldn’t make it out for a visit:
[Henry K. Gilman]
Dear Miss Austen –
I was sorry about not to be able to go to Staten Island on Thursday, particularly as it seems to be my last chance of seeing you until I get back from Chicago.
I really think there is some chance of my going. Our plans have been rearranged so many times that it is quite bewildering. It is settled at last that we are to leave New York on Tuesday evening at six.
I expect to leave the family out there, returning to New York by the fast train Sunday afternoon.
I have been so busy & bothered during the last few weeks & particularly the last few days that I hardly know where I am.
I think a day’s travel will be a real rest.
I will see you as soon after I return as possible.
As always, Yours, HKG
[Narrator]
In October, Bessie Strong tried again:
[Bessie Strong]
My dear Alice,
There seems to be no reason why I should not now accept your invitation, and unless something unforeseen happens I think I can go over to Staten Island on Thursday.
[Narrator]
It’s not clear if she made it out; Thursday was October 5th and Alice was photographing boats at the first race for the America’s Cup. On the evening of the final race, in her first letter to Alice, Daisy Elliot, who was apparently with Violet Ward, wrote from Brooklyn, with apologies that they, too, could not make it out to Staten Island:
[Daisy Elliott]
My dear Miss Austen:
I had thought to write tonight that Violet and I would go down by the ten o’clock boat if it did not rain and was not too windy. Since supper, however, I think it would be foolish to attempt it, for it is raining and looks as if it might all night, and the road will be in no condition for a ride.
I hope we shall have a good chance soon. I will let you know when we think of going.
How I should like to have seen the race today; it would have been exciting. And how fine is it that the cup stays with us!
I suppose you know the Wards have moved to town; I shall hope to see something of you then this winter and shall be happy to see you here at any time if you can get as far off as Brooklyn.
Sincerely, Daisy M. Elliott
[Narrator]
In November, Bessie Strong gave up:
[Bessie Strong]
I am too busy to think of going away but thank you just as much for holding the invitation open.
[Narrator]
And a couple days later, again, Henry Gillman:
[Henry K. Gilman]
Dear Miss Austen,
I received your note several days ago, but delayed answering, hoping I would be able to select a night when I could surely get down to see you —
I have been in such a rush ever since the first of September that I haven’t had any pleasure in life. I have so many things to tell you about that I am afraid I shall never catch up.
So far as I now know, I have nothing at all on for next week and any night that you are disengaged, I can probably come down.
I am writing in great haste as I am just about going out to a dinner party – may I ask you to let me know two or three evenings when you will be at leisure
Hastily yours, Henry K Gilman
+++++++++++
[Narrator]
Although not directly acknowledged by Alice Austen’s circle, in May of 1893, the New York stock exchange crashed, setting off what is now known as the Panic of 1893. Some of this may be reflected in Henry Gilman’s letters. In December, as Christmas approached, some of Alice’s enterprising friends prepared to sell some wares. Julia was peddling bottles of ink, and much earlier in the year, Violet had filed a patent application for a modified Bodkin – a needle-like threader to pull ribbon or for lacing corsets.
[Violet Ward]
To all whom it may concern:
Be it known that I, Maria E. G. McK. Ward, a citizen of the United States, residing in the city, county, and State if New York, have invented a new and useful Improvement in Bodkins, of which the following is a specification.
My invention relates to a new form of bodkin having spring ends or tails adapted to keep the path of the ribbon open and flat.
So far as I am aware the earlies form of bodkin used for drawing ribbon, tape, &c., through fabric or loops of fabric, consisted of a piece of rounded steel or ivory, pointed at one end and having an eye by which the ribbon or tape to be drawn is fastened.
[Narrator]
Violet received a patent for her newly designed bodkin on December 19.
Julia apparently had recently met Violet and mentioned her and the bodkins and gave an update on her ink enterprise.
[Julia Martin]
When you write will you send me Violet’s address as I lost the scrap on which I wrote it. I wish Violet had sent the bodkins before Christmas.
Ink orders keep coming in & so far it has given entire satisfaction.
[Narrator]
Even Bessie Strong’s annual Christmas letter suggests this new trend of economic self-sufficiency as she refers to Alice’s photography sales. It is unclear what exactly she is referring to here, but they may photos from the World’s Fair. And of course she lists her Christmas presents…
[Bessie Strong]
So, you are making money and getting rich?! Will you not take me in when you open your studio?
I did have a long list of Christmas gifts as you imagine, some of them are: A silver mounted pocketbook; a glove buttoner; set of silver studs; seven books, four beauties from Jack Van Dyke, two from Allen DeLaney, and one from Etta Parker, the last on “Photography.” Then I had money, two bottles of cologne, a glove box and two pairs of gloves, an exquisite handkerchief, cup and saucer, and several other little things.
When can you come and make me a visit?
[Narrator]
Weeks earlier, Henry Gilman wrote Alice his final letter. He is particularly agitated with her and seems overwhelmed with his business affairs:
[Henry K. Gilman]
Dear Miss Austen –
Of course, you have never approached the infernal regions nor ever will, so it is impossible that you should be able to realize the condition I have been in for the last three months.
It was uncertain whether I should go to the fair, up to three o’clock on the day we went. It was only at that time that I found I could tear myself away at six and then I simply had to drop everything & run.
I was gone from Tuesday night to Monday morning and had a fine time but returned to find things here worse than when I went away. And from that moment up to now I have hardly had any real peaceful moment. Even when my other senses had succumbed to Morpheus, my brain has been toddling bravely on.
I have been in town most of the time. – During October I was only home four or five nights.
My labors have not been so severe as they have been worrying and continuous. Several changes have occurred which alter the outlook somewhat (whether for better or worse remains to be seen) and which result in keeping my nose to the grindstone, so that I never know when I shall have a free evening.
I want to see you – there are lots of things to tell you.
Some night next week – Thursday? I will come down if I may.
Don’t think I have forgotten –
I have begun two or three letters to you – each has been interrupted & destroyed.
This barely escaped same fate.
Hoping to see you.
Hastily yours, Henry K Gilman
+++++++
[Narrator]
On December 22, 1893, Henry Gilman was found unconscious in his apartment with an open gas jet running. On December 28th, the New York Times reported:
“Henry K. Gilman, manager of the Rutland apartment house on West 57th Street, died at 1PM yesterday at Roosevelt Hospital, from pneumonia.
Mr. Gilman retired last Friday night, and in the morning did not appear at the usual time. At 8am Saturday a bell boy went to his room and found him lying on the bed unconscious from the effects of inhaling illuminating gas, which was pouring from an open burner in the room.
Mr. Gilman was removed to Roosevelt Hospital, and after a hard struggle, was restored to consciousness. He entirely recovered from the effects of the gas, but typhoid pneumonia set in, and he steadily grew worse.
Mr. Gilman’s assistant, Mr. Heath, says there are no grounds for the rumor that Mr. Gilman tried to commit suicide. Mr. Gilman came in feeling ill, he says, threw himself on the bed, and fell asleep. The room occupied by him was of peculiar shape and under certain circumstances a strong draught of air is drawn through the room.
Mr. Heath thinks that Mr. Gilman left the door open, and that a draught of air slammed it shut, at the same time blowing out the gas. He also says that Dr. Carter, the house physician at Roosevelt Hospital, thinks pneumonia had started before Gilman was overcome with gas. Dr. Carter had retired when a reporter for the New York Times called at the hospital last evening and could not be seen.
Mr. Gilman’s father, who is a clergyman in Flushing, Long Island, was present when he died.”
+++++++++++
[Narrator]
If you or anyone you know is struggling with depression or suicidal thoughts, help is available.
For 24/7 confidential support in the United States, call or text 988.
+++++++++++
[Narrator]
In the next episode, more life changes, Alice Austen becomes a New York street photographer, she embarks on a quest to buy a piano, and begins collaborating with Violet Ward as a new recreational obsession replaces tennis:
[Julia Martin]
Trudie wrote me a very nice letter in answer to one of mine. She wrote to me all Staten Island had gone “mad” over bicycling and she should have to go mad, too.
+++++++++++
[Narrator]
This chapter featured the following voice talent in their order of appearance:
Natalie Welber, Liv Glassman, Madeleine Bagnall, Reute Butler, Charlie Niccolini, Tom Bannos, Rachel Hilbert, Benjamin Jouras, and Kristen Waagner.
Sound editor: Kendall Barron
Original music by Nicolas Rosa-Palermo and me, Pamela Bannos.
Other music from FreeSound, MusOpen and other public domain and attributed sources – links are in the website that accompanies this podcast, where you’ll also find images of some of the letters and photographs that are referred to in each episode. That’s My Dear Alice dot ORG.
Cast in the order of appearance:
Bessie Strong: NATALIE WELBER
Julia Martin: LIV GLASSMAN
Violet Ward: MADELEINE BAGNALL
Alice Cornell Austen: REUTE BUTLER
Ralph Munroe: CHARLIE NICCOLINI
Reporter: TOM BANNOS
Trude Eccleston: RACHEL HILBERT
Henry Gilman: BENJAMIN JOURAS
Daisy Elliott: KRISTEN WAAGNER
Voices in the introduction (in order):
Ella Stevens
Maya Slaughter
Ella Stevens
Kylie Boyd
Natalie Welber
Graham Goodwin
Madeleine Bagnall
Efren Ponce
Cristina Bragalone
Reute Butler
Ella Stevens
Benjamine Jouras
Kristen Waagner
MUSIC AND SOUND FILES USED IN THIS EPISODE:
Theme music by Nicolas Rosa-Palermo: Interpretation of the 1889 Santiago Waltz
The Edwardian Pianist (Adam Ramet) by permission:
1893: Alan Macey, Impudence Schottische.
1881: G.D. Wilson, Moonlight on the Hudson.
1884: Paul Lacombe, Aubade Printaniere, Op. 37.
The Edwardian Pianist’s YouTube Channel
Sheet Music Singer (Fred Feild) by permission:
1855: Richard Milburn, Listen to the Mocking Bird (derived from)
The Sheet Music Singer’s YouTube Channel
Musopen website:
1835: Frederic Chopin, Waltz in A flat major ‘Farewell,’ Op. 60 No. 1, played by Olga Gurevich. (licensed under Creative Commons Public Domain Mark 1.0 license)
1890: Enrique Granados, 12 Danzas Españolas, Op. 37 – X. Danza Triste, Melancolica, played by Monica Alianello. (licensed under Creative Commons Public Domain Mark 1.0 license)
Lucas Gonze:
1854: D.E. Jannon, Carrie Waltz. Played on 1890 parlor guitar.
(licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0)
FreeSound
Lizziam, Autumn Leaf. (licensed under Creative Commons 0 license)
Pamela Bannos
Lilty Waltz – Variations (opening music)
Adobe Stock
Music:
Happy Orchestral Ballet, Audio standard license, via Adobe Stock
Who We Are, Audio standard license, via Adobe Stock
Sound Effects:
Weather Ambience Rain Thunderstorm Thunder 01, Audio standard license, via Adobe Stock
Weather Ambience Storm Sea Rain Thunder Waves Ocean Wind 01, Audio standard license, via Adobe Stock
Human Crowd Cheer 04, Audio standard license, via Adobe Stock
This episode begins with talk of photography and its popularity, including among Alice Austen’s friends and correspondents.
The image of Bessie Strong with her cousin Jack Van Dyke was taken on Alice Austen’s 26th birthday in 1892. It shows the emulsion peeling from the glass plate negative. John Charles Van Dyke was an art historian who taught at Rutgers University and also gave hugely popular lectures. In one of Strong’s letters she writes, “Jack had about a thousand people at his lecture on Monday, in Philadelphia notwithstanding the awful storm, and on Wednesday, 1,300. Shall not see him again for some time as he goes to Washington and Boston this week.”
Mr. Hopper and his camera. A. Minshall Hopper was 18-years-old the summer he hung out with Alice and Trude Eccleston at Watkins Glen, NY. Chapter 4 details the fun they had taking pictures and corresponding.
Clear Comfort front lawn with flag, camera, telescope, and picnic. This photo’s view of the Narrows shows how close the Austen house was to passing vessels. Violet Ward and Trude Eccleston sit with their back to the tree, watching the boats. Alice Austen shot hundreds of photographs of boats and ships from the front lawn. Here is one from 1893.
Camera Mosaics was a venue that shared camera club photographs through contests and submissions. Alice Austen was a member of the Jersey City Camera Club.
Alice Austen accompanied her Aunt Nellie (her Uncle Peter’s wife), Nellie’s brother Ralph Munroe, and another man named Thomas Q. Brown on a canal excursion. Nellie and Alice disembarked at Annapolis, Maryland, and the men continued on to Biscayne Bay, Florida. Ralph Munroe was a yacht designer and an original settler in Coconut Grove, Florida. His home remains as part of Barnacle Historical State Park.
Ralph Munroe and Thomas Brown both corresponded with Alice Austen. Brown is always referred to as “Butterball” – it may have been because of his voracious appetite, which Munroe alludes to in a letter to Austen. Brown nicknamed Alice “Gabriel” in his letters, which may have referenced the biblical horn blower – she blows into a conch shell in one photo.
Austen made many photographs along the way from New Jersey to Maryland, and she sent some of them to Brown and Munroe, who thank her for them in their letters.
Some examples:
“Canal stern of Wabun Ralph & Butterball taking photo“
“Four mules & Wabun“
“Interior of Wabun cabin” (Butterball & Nellie Austen)
“Lock gates opening Wabun inside of deep lock 11 ft.“
“Nellie & I returning laden from Chester“
“Naval launch towing Wabun to anchor“
“Our party in stern of Wabun guns“
“Our party in stern of Wabun” (Alice blowing conch shell)
“Wabun in first lock“
“Tug boat in deep Lock & Butterball“
Daisy Elliot was one of America’s first women who identified as an athlete. She became the athletic director of the Berkeley Ladies Athletic Club in New York City. Violet and Carrie Ward appear in some sort of athletic “uniform” in these photos.
An 1889 newspaper passage about a summer course at Harvard University (referred to in the audio narrative) states, “Miss Elliott took the prizes in dumb bell, club swinging, vaulting and climbing exercises. She went up a long rope extended from the ceiling hand over hand like a sailor, clean to the top, winning great applause.”
The photograph, “Miss Elliott on rings.”
The photograph, “Miss Elliott in pose.”
The photograph, “Group apparatus.”
In July 1893, Alice Austen spent two weeks at Chicago’s Columbian Exposition, taking many photographs on 4×5” glass plate negatives. She copyrighted 25 photographs. It is unknown if her intention was to publish them as a book or portfolio, but she make and sell many prints. Chapter 6 tells of an extensive order from some women who lived around Washington Square in Manhattan.
Some World’s Fair photographs:
“Administration dome & chair house“
“Art Building & three guards“
“Big Fountain McMonnies“
“Golden door Transportation Building“
“Peristyle & golden statue of Liberty“
“Statue of Columbus with flag in front of Administration“
“The Ferris Wheel from Chicago University“
“The three Caravels“
As in earlier summers when they went elsewhere, Austen accompanied the Eccleston family in 1893 to Lake George in the Adirondacks in upstate New York. She creatively photographed Trude Eccleston in a position meant to portray her face in reflection while also obscuring it with her hat.
Violet Ward applied for a patent for her improved design of a “bodkin,” which is a needle-like threading object for hems or corsets. See her entire patent application here.
Henry Gilman began writing to Alice Austen in 1889, inviting her to an outing that she declined because of her tennis matches. The next Gilman letter in the collection appears nearly two years later. His letters are a notable contrast to the fun and lightness that are evident in Austen’s photographs and in her other correspondences. He always calls her Miss Austen, and as is evident in her negative sleeve, Alice called him Mr. Gilman. While many of Gilman’s letters are negotiating visits, it is hard to imagine what kind of relationship they may have had. The only photograph of Henry K. Gilman shows him playing cards with Alice and Julie Bredt and another man.
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