Clara and Mr. Tiffany by Susan Vreeland May Bookclub Online

[JoanP]

The Book Club Online is  the oldest  book club on the Internet, begun in 1996, open to everyone.  We offer cordial discussions of one book a month,  24/7 and  enjoy the company of readers from all over the world.  Everyone is welcome to join in.

CLARA and MR. TIFFANY

by Susan Vreeland

"For a century, everyone assumed that the iconic Tiffany lamps were conceived and designed by that American master of stained glass, Louis Comfort Tiffany. Not so! It was a woman!" (Susan Vreeland)

Vreeland captures Gilded Age New York and its atmosphere--robber barons, sweatshops, colorful characters, ateliers from the  voluminous letters belonging to the Tiffany glass studio manager, Clara Driscoll, discovered by the author (Amazon review ).

"My last lampshade was accepted and I am having it made now. It will be quite expensive, but I think it will be attractive and that the general public will admire it. The one before this was a purple and red scheme with opal to lighten and soften it. Mr. Tiffany thought it was very fine and Mr. Mitchell thought it was the ugliest thing he ever saw."                                                       (Letter from Clara Driscoll)

Discussion Schedule:

May 1-8 ~ Chapters 1-12
May 9-15 ~ Chapters 13-24
May 16-22 ~ Chapters 25-37
May 23-31 ~ Chapters 38-47
and the Afterward  

Some Topics for Consideration
May 16 - 22 ~ Chapters 25 - 37

1.  How do you think Clara feels when Alice and Lillian are sent to start a new department in Corona, especially when she’s told that Mr Tiffany visits there twice a week?

2.  At one point Clara considers leaving.  Out of the blue she gets an offer.  What would you do, if it were you?  What do you think kept Clara from accepting the Lamb offer?

3.  Does Clara remind you of any other women who paved careers for themselves in the days before women’s lib?

4.  When at the beach house with Bernard, Clara gets upset when Bernard innocently says that she could sit by a pool just like Narcissus.  Is Clara self-absorbed?  Why would anyone think she might be?

5.  Why do you think Clara wanted her girls to take on the rush order of the six windows?  Was it worth it?

6.  So many emotions appear in this book – anger, happiness, sorrow, bafflement,  etc.  Is there any particular scene or reaction so far that has made an impression on you?
  

Related Links:
 NPR Interview with Susan Vreeland;
 Morse Museum, Winter Park, FL - World's largest collection of Tiffany glass;
 Tiffany Girls on Exhibition Video;
 Susan Vreeland Website for Clara

Discussion Leaders:  Pedln  & Annie

[JoanP]

Great sites - photos of the fish lamp.  I loved them all.  Do you suppose that the mosaic base using Mr. Tiffany's handful of mother of pearl shells, was a one-of-a-kind base...very expensive and time consuming to make? Maybe the bases that we see in the photos replaced the seahorse mosaic base in later models - and that's what we are seeing here? 
If so, I think we are fortunate to see Clara's  actual mosaic base - there must not be very many photos of it.

[pedln]

I think George Waldo is a real person because he is identified as one of the designers of the Vanderbuilt bedroom.

And Mr Belknap is real --

Grueby faience stood in the mainstream of Arts and Crafts and Art Nouveau design in the United States: in the course of the company's history the early designers Graves and Kendrick were replaced by the architect Addison LeBoutillier and Henry Belknap, who had worked with Louis Comfort Tiffany.

Clara and MR. Belknap talk about masquerades, and he says, "We all have masquerades of one sort or another."  Even when our characters are fictional we wonder if they are masquerading as real.

I'm somewhat reminded of the "story" biographies of Clara Ingram Judson and others like her, that I enjoyed so much as a kid.  The author included her own visualizations and dialogues, but they were exciting books about real people.

[Steph]

I agree that Vreeland definitely makes up the conversations and opinions, but there is such a mixture of real and unreal. So George was a real person..Do you suppose this means that Edwin was as well. He is such a mystery to me..But maybe this next section will have more information on him.. Clara does like the men..

[ANNIE]

Steph:: Clara does like the men..

Ah, yes she does.  If you go back to the beginning of the book and read some of it over, she is constantly checking out the men.  I think she is always looking for the "right guy" for herself and always holding them up to Francis (the first mistake she made).  Also, she really does appreciate all the help she gets from the men at the boarding house.  Do you think when she is accomplishing a task (like bicycling and many men helping), she pays close attention to how they approach helping her and maybe she likes being seen in their company?  It must make her feel special.  Well, that's normal, isn't it?  To me her thoughts about men in general make her look immature, especially, when I stop and remember she is 37 yrs old, not 18 anymore!

[JoanP]

Wasn't Clara lucky to have found this particular  boarding house?  Remember the first one she looked at - and had sense enough to run away from after one look around?  But seriously, a single widow, she might have found a quiet little room with a very different, less affable crowd sitting  around the dinner table.  

I get the feeling that she has so many friends in the house, that her life would be quite full - even without that one special man.  She has decided to give up on Bernard - he still hasn't revealed whether he's engaed for not.  She'll forget about love and romance - and concentrate on her work.  Which she does find satisfying, rewarding and fulfilling, don't you think?

Of the lamps, the one that gets my attention is the Wisteria lamp -   I liked Henry Belknap's frank assessment of her work - he includes Mr. T in his criticism so it probably didn't sting her too much.  .  Too florid, too ornate for the new age - Art Nouveau is the rage.  He started talking about the clock she was designing, but could he have been referring to other pieces too?   the lamps?  I think the Tiffany lamps, especially those with the flat panels would work with the Frank Lloyd Wright architecture in the new age of modernism, don't you?  -

I loved reading of the New Year's celebration - 1900 style.  It reminded me of the way we celebrated 2000 in the streets of Washington

[ANNIE]

Before I forget, I wanted to tell you that my sister, Mary, gave me a magnet bookmark with a
Tiffany window printed on it.  Entitled "Hibiscus and Parrots", I looked it up so you all could see it.  The print below the photo of this window tells the history of how it was made with faverile glass.
 
http://www.flickr.com/photos/emmcnamee/5143795909/

JoanP
That Wisteria lamp is truly a work of beauty.  I like the way they made the tree limbs at the top using the lead came.  And, of course, tree trunk that Tiffany designed for it, is genius!
Here's a page that can be enlarged by clicking on the Wisteria lamp so one can see how the light is used to show it better.  Or one can see parts of the lamp by clicking on different pics on the right side and then one can click again and it will get even larger.

http://www.tiffany-lamps.de/TIFFANY_LAMPS/18IN_Wisteria_royalblue/AA.html

And for you to mention Frank lloyd Wright gave me a start.  Are you reading my mind?  My first reaction to Tiffany was that he was so like Wright in his search for perfection and beauty (as he saw it).  I wonder if they ever met.  Probably couldn't have both of them in the same room for long what with all that  testosterone and artistic talent zooming around!

Pedl'n,
Well, guess what, I went to see the photos of the Tiffany lamps being made by that company in Germany.  I am impressed with their work.  And they seem to have remained true to Clara's designs.  It took me an hour to peruse each of the photos and read how they accomplished their art work.  I wondered about the time spent on the lamp and how much they charge for a lamp.  I will return to that page and let you know.

[pedln]

Annie, lucky you with your Parrot and Hibiscus bookmark.  It’s lovely.  And having seen the for “favrile” so many times, I decided I’d better find out just what it was, rather than saying, “oh yeah, a favrile base.”   Tiffany patented favrile glass in 1880.

Favrile is different from other iridescent glasses because its color is not just on the surface, but imbedded in the glass. The original trade name Fabrile was derived from an Old English word, fabrile, meaning "hand-wrought" or handcrafted. Tiffany later changed the word to Favrile "since this sounded better". 

Favrile glass often has a distinctive characteristic that is common in some glass from Classical antiquity: it possesses a superficial iridescence. This iridescence causes the surface to shimmer, but also causes a degree of opacity. This iridescent effect of the glass was obtained by mixing different colors of glass together while hot.

According to Tiffany:
"Favrile glass is distinguished by brilliant or deeply toned colors, usually iridescent like the wings of certain American butterflies, the necks of pigeons and peacocks, the wing covers of various beetles."

Yay, they brought in the new millenium, Clara and her friends.  Can you believe they have all been living there together for almost eight years.  I wonder if that was typical for some people, those without ties or family around – even couples like the Hacleys?

But what a New Year’s gift from Mr. Mitchell:
“Beginning immediately, a new policy requires that the Women’s Glass Cutting Department pay the overhead cost of $50  a month for rent of your studio space.”

They have to pay their employer to work in his building?  And Mr. Tiffany tells Clara to go along with it.  He’s an engima, isn’t he?  Very sensitive to matters of art, but can totally brush other things aside, ignoring how others are affected.

JoanP, even the boarders didn’t think much of the clock.  I love one of the descriptions --
“eight feet of ideas in a two-foot clock”

[Steph]

I think that  some of what Clara endures at work has to do with his dislike to women employees. Only Mr. T seems to value them.

[JoanP]

Thanks for the information on "fabile" glass, which Tiffany renamed "favrile" because it "sounded better"  - more French?  Pretty funny.  I'd wondered about what it was, meant to look it up.  Thanks again, Pedln.

Steph, the women's position with Tiffany's seems more and more precarious.  Mr. Tiffany's lone voice of support is important, yes, but there are so many who have his ear - including his financial advisors, who I am convinced, report to his father Charles, who is really supporting his son's glassworks.

I'm fearing for Clara whenever Louis Tiffany gets all authoritarian and treats her like just another employee. (and therefore expendable?)  I took it personally when I learned that he didn't give her recognition for her lamp - wasn't it the dragonfly lamp that won the bronze medal in Paris?  He passed it off in the press releases,  as his own!

I've yet to listen to the NPR interview link in the heading, but came across this one in an effort to learn more about George Waldo.  From her letters, it is clear that HE and other homosexual boarders were REAL.
This interview is interesting too because it tells more about the letters, the source of Vreeland's book.  There were thousands of letters - round-robin letters sent to Clara's mother and sisters!  Just think of how little would be known about this Tiffany glass if it were not for Clara's Victorian passion for letter-writing!  Can't help but think of the loss of historical information of our time - as we have replaced letter-writing with email!

I think you might LIKE this Interview with Susan Vreeland in March 2010
.  (It's 20 minutes long - I filed my nails while listening to it.)

[pedln]

JoanP, the NPR link in the heading is both text and audio. I can’t do audio, but did find another recent (April, 2011) text interview within the link you provided.  In this one, she talks a lot about her writing process, a few things about Clara in particular. (Note:  may include a spoiler from the last section.)

Vreeland on her Writing

In regard to the fine line that is walked when creating historical fiction, Vreeland said, “I never change history on any point that is significant. I invent characters when history doesn't give me a person with whom the main character was intimate.” 

 And she rarely changes the time of events, only when necessary for narrative purposes.

The new millenium doesn’t seem to bode well for Clara.  First her budget problems with Mr. Mitchell, and then later wishing she could recall the harsh words she said to him.

Her dragonfly lamp wins an award at the Paris exhibition, but  according to the press, everything was exhibited under Tiffany’s name.

George gets sick.  Were you surprised at where he ended up?

Then Alice and Lillian are sent to start a new department in Corona.  And do we see just a tiny bit of the green-eyed monster popping up in there, when it’s discovered that  Mr. Tiffany visits it twice a week?

At one point she considers leaving.  What would you do, if it were you?

[Steph]

Clar a and Mr. T have such a complicated relationship. She wants to be the number one girl.. no question. I love the bike ones. They are having such a good time..George... now that was a surprise.

[JoanP]

Funny - just turned on the TV for the morning news and there is the TIFFANY name in the headlines...it seems that Newt Gingrich's wife has run up a huge debt in Tiffany jewelry.  (This is headline news?)
So the  jewelry line is thriving - I'm wondering whether  the glassworks continues in any way today- even if reproducing some of the old designs?  It will be interesting to learn whether the Tiffany glass design studio closed during his lifetime or after Mr. T's death...
And what will become of Clara? She is so dedicated to this job - to these girls.   I'm jumping ahead, I know.  Sorry.

Now that we know the extent of the letters exchanged between Clara and her mother and sisters, ("thousands" of them, according to Susan Vreeland!) - we can see that Clara's men described in these pages were real.  Vreeland tells us that there were FIVE men she loved, men who loved her.
 Are we including Mr. Belknap in this five?  Yes, I was surprised at the connection between Tiffany's artistic director and George Waldo of the boarding house gang, Pedln.  Clara has even stronger support at Tiffany's now than I realized - than she realized!  This was a huge discovery!

And now we see Bernard as a strong contender for her affection.  The bikers do have fun, don't they, Steph?  Did they call bikes, "wheels"? Our Pedln is a biker.  Will you describe your "wheel," Pedln?.  What I really liked was the summer cottage the four bicyclists rented out for the summer in my old stomping grounds - Point Pleasant, New Jersey.  Interesting that they went to New Jersey rather than to one of the NY beaches.  For years my "girlfriends" and I rented or stayed in guest houses in Point Pleasant.  We were not as liberated as this foursome, though - never considered staying in the same house with "boys."

Can Bernard be the "one"?  Or can Clara ever settle for anyone who will interfere with  her complicated relationship with Mr. T? 

[ANNIE]

I found "The Flight of Souls" which was not exactly what the Paris journalists enjoyed.  "Pg228".

http://www.flickr.com/photos/dsgeo/2240806748/

And didn't you love what Bernard said to Clara about her becoming well known later in time?

"Someday, when women become considered equal to men, it will become known that a woman of great importance created those lamps.  This isn't the MIddle Ages, Clara.  You will not be lost to history like the makers of those medieval windows in Gloucester are.  Some will find you."


And our author has done a wonderful job of showing us the lives of Clara and her girls.

[pedln]

Annie, your link to Flight of Souls  opened up all kinds of interesting things.  We should really be grateful to the Flickr photographers.  If you have a chance, take a look at the photos in the  Tiffany Favrile Glass group.   That's what led me to the Reid Memorial Presbyterian Church in Richmond, Indiana.  I'm thinking here that these were probably made my the Men's Window Dept?

Reid Memorial Presbyterian

One of the blurbs under one photo said that there were TEN churches in the country that had Tiffany windows.  Two of them are in Richmond, IN, as the Episcopal church there has one.  That low number surprises me.  I'm think we've seen more than that this past month.

Tiffany Favrile Glass Group

A site to explore at leisure.

(Am getting out here before I lose this)

[pedln]

JoanP, ha ha -- used to bike, and loved it.  Somehow I just got a mental block about it -- afraid I couldn't stop or start or get  off in time.  Used to ride a century  once a year (we  have a guy in town who rides one once a month.)  At least my kids have got the genes.    They all ride.  Judy and Liz are going to Germany for two weeks next week, taking their tandem -- it comes apart and fits into two bags.  Sometimes I think about getting a three-wheeler -- if it had enough gears.

Re:  Point Pleasant -- I just found it on the map.  How did they get there?  It must have been by ferry.  Now I'm confused because I was under the impression that they stayed at the cottage for the summer, but that would not be a bike commute in that era.  Help help, here.

[MaryH]

I feel so fortunate for having found all of you.  I can’t tell you how much your discussions and research have added to my experience of reading this book.  Thanks to you all!

The theme of conflict between a successful business and artistic expression is one I keep thinking about.  Senior Mr. Tiffany knows how to make money, while Louis Tiffany is driven to create art that is world renown.  Louis, however, has clearly not inherited his father’s head for business.

I’m thinking cost accounting was introduced as a way to manage the bottom line while creating art pieces.  No wonder Mr. Mitchell, business manager, brings so much tension to the story.  Think how much more helpful he could be if he could deliver his message with tact and empathy.

[ANNIE]

Speaking of 'favrile' glass, take a look at this!  Wow!

http://www.lc-tiffany.com/utility/dataforms/NeighborhoodCatalogImages.cfm?Proprietor=unique@arsh.com&Showimage=yes&InventoryNumber=un051221-3

MaryH,
We are glad you found us too.  Yes, Mr Mitchell is really crochety and I don't think he will ever improve.  Part of his problem with Clara seems to be that she is a woman.  He just doesn't know what to say when she answers him back.

[salan]

Clara does seem rather  "man hungry", doesn't she.  She seems to have poor choices in men.  Kinda' makes you wonder, doesn't it. 
George and Mr. Belknap--now that was a surprise to me!

It seems like Mr. Mitchell has a lot of power over Mr. Tiffany.  Does he work for Charles Tiffany (who evidently holds the purse strings??

Ah ha!  We finally hear from Edwin after 6 years.  Do we believe him, or does he conveniently forget when life gets to him???
Sally

[Steph]

The Edwin letter is amazing. Makes no sense at all.. She is much better off without him, but the whole episode is an example of poor planning. Is it real?? I hope so, because if not, then the author threw in some sort of red herring for us..

[ANNIE]

After reading Edwin's letter and listening to Geoge's explanation of other similar incidents in Edwin's letter, I think he has 'stress memory loss".  Something real happened to him three times that we know of and there might have been more.
I like Clara's way with the gay men as she accepts them without any questions.  That is the way the American Indian seemed to do also, in all the stories I have read.  After all, in the end, a person is a person now matter what.   

[JoanP]

Steph, do you think the letter from Edwin was S. Vreeland's creation or did Clara write about Edwin's  letter to her mother?  It struck me as odd, too.  Did he write to their parents?  Now they know where Edwin is heading - why would George say, "we may never know what happened to him?  Why isn't the family planning a trip to CA to find their son?  How many copper mines can there be in Northern CA?

Pedln, that's a good question - how did Clara and the girls manage to pedal from NY to the NJ shore?  I used to live in NJ across the river from New York...about 40 minutes by car from the city.  From my home in NJ, it was roughly an hour car ride to Point Pleasant.  You figure it out - how long would it take to get to Point Pleasant by bike.  They followed this first expedition the following weekend!  These girls must have been in shape!  Lillian tells Alice about the cottage near her aunt's house in Point Pleasant - and so Alice, Mr. York, Bernard and Clara rent out the cottage for the summer.  Did they all bike down the shore?
Pedln, a ferry?  There is a ferry between Ny and Northern NJ - but I'm intrigued with the idea of a ferry from the NYC to the Jersey shore.  Will check on that today!

Thank you so much for all the links to the glass creations described in these pages, Annie. I loved the flower in favrile glass - the irredescence reminded me of carnival glass I used to collect.  Loved the glass flower stem as well.

 I'm amused at the division between the men's and the women's departments, aren't you?  I assume that the distinctions between the two groups is coming from Clara's letters home.  The women have it all over the men when it comes to color selecting and cutting/pasting small pieces, which men are not capable of doing.  I find these comments amusing...especially when considering the pieces Mr. T. had made in his own studios.  Is Mr. T. nursing along the competitive feelings between the men and the women, hoping to stimulate production?

[JoanP]

I love the way Vreeland goes back and forth from studio to Clara's personal life - much of which she probably found in the letters. 
Sally, sometimes Clara does seem man-hungry.  I'm not sure if Vreeland found this statement in the letters, or if she put these words into her mouth:

"I'm longing for intimacy with a man and am constrained.  Mr. T's policy forces me to keep love at bay..."

I'm undecided as to what keeps Clara from taking up Frederick Lamb's job offer - is it her position at Tiffany's, her girls at the studio OR HER FEELINGS FOR MR.T.  which do you think?

"He and I had a bridge that no one else traveled, that made us artistic lovers, passionate, without a touch of the flesh."

Clearly she feels passionate about the man, but is the passion one-sided?  Do you find yourself wondering what he feels for her? Mary H - if Louis T was so submerged in artistic expression, he may not have noticed Clara's attachment and her idea of their being "artistic lovers." 

[pedln]

MaryH, we’re so glad you found us, as well.  Good point about the cost accounting and bottom line. Thinking it over, one can almost feel sorry for Mr. Mitchell.  It must have been really frustrating for him – between a rock and a hard place.  The father who wants good news from the ledger and the son who’s so very talented and creative in artistic matters, but a bit hazy on the finances.

Sally, that was a surprise about Mr. Belknap, wasn’t it.  But now that truth is out the friendship is deepened.  I didn’t realize that it was six years before they heard from Edwin.  Good eye, there.  Maybe it is something like stress memory loss.  But not only was he AWOL from Clara, the US Govt. also has a claim on him.

Steph, I keep wondering, too,  if the Edwin relationship is real or just part of the author’s creativity. I don’t think it’s a red herring.  Can’t help but wonder now just what all was in the letters.  Wouldn’t you love to see them.

The whole letter thing is what amazes me, and the fact that Clara wasn’t recognized for her designs and her work.  Until this decade.  That German designer, Holzer, was recognized from the get-go.  Someone said it before – women workers were the drones.  Work and keep quiet..  Had any of you heard of Candace Wheeler before?  I wonder if mabel/jean or bellemere know of her.  They’re pretty knowledgable about women’s history.

Hey, JOanP, we're posting at the same time.  Back later.

[Laura]

One of the “conflicts” that provided a lot of forward momentum to the story, for me, was the choices Clara had to make about her work life.  I kept asking myself the question, “Does she really have any choices?”  And I think she did.  She had the choice to work at Tiffany or to work somewhere else.   Mr. Tiffany offered her fulfilling work, even if it did come without recognition and with tedious time keeping and labor tracking duties.  She could have decided she was fed up with Mr. Tiffany, but she chose to remain in his employ despite her trials with him.  She made that choice many times.  She liked her job and the creative freedom it afforded her.

[Laura]

I have nothing but sympathy for Edwin, and George and Clara for having to bear the burdens of his disappearance.  I do think Edwin had some kind of medical condition.  You do occasionally hear of someone who can’t remember who they are or anything about themselves, who can’t remember how he or she ended up in a place so many days or months later.

[Steph]

Website going nuts this am.. Finally got it back.
I was really amazed at the men who seemed to really believe the women are stealing their jobs. Of course Mr. T started it all with letting the women do the windows. But still the vindictiveness of the union, not letting women in and trying to eliminate them from work is horrible. I would guess quite true, but still awful.

[JoanP]

"She could have decided she was fed up with Mr. Tiffany, but she chose to remain in his employ despite her trials with him.  She made that choice many times.  She liked her job and the creative freedom it afforded her."  Laura

Just curious to hear whether you think that it was her position and freedom at Tiffany's that kept Clara from moving - or was it her relationship with Mr. T. that prevented her from accepting the job with Frederick Lamb, Laura?  I get the feeling that she is becoming more and more involved with her  studio "girls" - even more so than with her own creative expression.  Do you sense that?  Of course, that doesn't explain her jealousy when she realized that her Mr. T is keeping company with Lillian and Alice at Corona...

Steph, I think Mr. T. has only himself to blame for stirring things up between the men and the women.  Keeping them as two separate and competitive  camps - at war.  With their jobs at stake.

The term "gay nineties"  has been in the back of my mind - decided to look it up and find that it is an American term - the Brits called the age "the Naughty Nineties."  (I think this is more appropriate.)

You might  be as interested as I was -  in the climate  in which Clara was forming her own small demonstration for women's rights as she organized her girls in a march to keep their jobs.

"Gay Nineties is an American nostalgic term that refers to the decade of the 1890s. It is known in the UK as the Naughty Nineties, and refers there to the decade of supposedly decadent art by Aubrey Beardsley, the witty plays and trial of Oscar Wilde, society scandals and the beginning of the suffragette movement."  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gay_Nineties


"Suffragette is a term coined by the Daily Mail newspaper as a derogatory label for members of the late 19th and early 20th century movement for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom, in particular members of the Women's Social and Political Union (WSPU). However, after former and then active members of the movement began to reclaim the word, the term became a label without negative connotations"  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suffragette

"The National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS), also known as the Suffragists (not to be confused with the suffragettes) was an organisation of women's suffrage societies in the United Kingdom

The group was founded in 1897 by the merger of the National Central Society for Women's Suffrage and the Central Committee, National Society for Women's Suffrage, the groups having originally split in 1888.The groups united under the leadership Millicent Fawcett, who was the president of the society for over twenty years, took over. The organisation was democratic, aiming to achieve women's suffrage through peaceful and legal means, in particular by introducing Parliamentary Bills and holding meetings to explain and promote their aims."

So Clara had knowledge of the demonstrations for women's rights at this time - and so did Mr. T.

[pedln]

One of the “conflicts” that provided a lot of forward momentum to the story, for me, was the choices Clara had to make about her work life.  .   .  She liked her job and the creative freedom it afforded her.

Laura, I agree.  And intermingled with the choices are her feelings about herself.  Is she self-absorbed?

“If I felt estranged from Mr. Tiffany and diminished by his attentions to Alice and Lillian, what I needed to do was to invite  his collaboration more. .     .     .
Was the need for recognition so vital that I would give up love in order to get it?  Had Mr. Tiffany injured me intentionally.  No.  I would not creep away just because he gave attention to others.”

Steph, what an awful scene that was, with the men just marching in and taking out the windows.  And Mr. Tiffany – egnima, egnima, egnima – he’s flaky, he’s astute, he’s insensitive, he’s sensitive.  How did anyone know where they stood with him?  I guess he let the men get away with what they did because he was afraid of union power.  And his wife was ill when that happened.

JoanP, interesting info about the women’s organizations.  We were thinking along the same lines.  Middle of the night reading Clara brought to mind Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.  I really like Anthony’s motto, and don’t remember ever hearing it before.

The true republic --  men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less.

[pedln]

Apparently there was a big Glass Cutters strike in 1892, and no doubt Mr. Tiffany did not want those problems again.  Links here from the New York Times. Below -- Feb. 2007, just before the NY Historical Society Exhibit about the Tiffany Girls.

Clara Driscoll Exhibit

Clara Driscoll was born Clara Pierce Wolcott on Dec. 15, 1861, in Tallmadge, Ohio, a town about 40 miles south of Cleveland. Her father died when she was 12, leaving her mother to raise Clara and three younger sisters. The Wolcott girls were bright, ambitious and, unlike many women of the era, strongly encouraged to pursue higher education. Clara showed an aptitude for art and attended design school in Cleveland, working for a local furniture maker before moving to New York, where she enrolled in the new Metropolitan Museum Art School. By 1888 she was employed at the Tiffany Studios, where she remained for more than 20 years.

Most of this was unknown to scholars as recently as the fall of 2005, when a man approached Mr. Eidelberg after a lecture, said that he was a descendant of Clara Driscoll, and asked if he was interested in seeing letters that she had written at the turn of the 20th century. Mr. Eidelberg had recently published a book about Tiffany lamps and knew Driscoll’s name in connection with a group of women who, during a strike by the men of the Lead Glaziers and Glass Cutters Union in 1892, were hired in large numbers by Tiffany to cut glass.

There are only comparatively few men in the city, not over 150, who are competent to do the work required by the manufacturers, and they have a close organization known as the Lead Glaziers and Glass Cutters’ Union.  This empbraces all the workers in the glass shops.  Their places cannot be filled, and the employers refuse to yield to the terms demanded.

The men ask for a reduction of ten working hours a week, making fifty hours a week’s work, and also an increase of wages to $20 for cutters and $18 for glaziers per week.

(12/28/1892) NY Times

Glass Cutters Union on Strike   The full article, in PDF format.

That was 1892.  Now, it's around 1900-1902.  Clara is making $35 a week.  I wonder how that compares with the Glass Cutters, 10 years later.

[Steph]

So
Clara had descendents?? That answers a question, I had.. I just have problems with  why Clara and th e women thought that making the windows would not cause a rupture.. She really was too interested in making Mr. T admire her more..

[ANNIE]

Steph,
Where is the referral to Clara's descendants?  I haven't seen that part yet.

Clara's hiring of Nathaniel Hawthorne's granddaughter, Beatrix Hawthorne was enticing.  Beatrix  seems quite well read and interested in the artists of earlier times.  Here's a link to Masaccio's "The Expulsion of Adam and Eve from Eden" and the story of how de Medici covered them.  Also a little aside about Michalangelo and the Sistine Chapel.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expulsion_from_the_Garden_of_Eden

And we learn from these short paragraphs that Dreiser's "Sister Carrie" is banned?  How was that accomplished?  Who banned it?  The publisher, Doubleday!

"Sister Carrie - Theodore Dreiser - 1900
 
Considered by many to be the first great novel of the twentieth century, Sister Carrie (1900) has nevertheless been a troubled—and troubling—work from its very beginning. The inspiration for Dreiser's debut novel is a scandal within his own family, as his sister Emma once ran away with a man who had stolen from his employer's safe, a situation recreated in the most dramatic moment of the novel. The novel's original publisher, Frank Doubleday, was scandalized by a work that seemed to reward immorality, and tried to bury the book with a small print run. Discouraged by a seeming lack of critical or popular response, Dreiser did not complete another novel for ten years." BookRag

And Beatrix also tells Clara that Hawthorrne made up all of the "Scarlet Letter".  I had always assumed that he did, since it was placed in the fiction shelves at the library.

[pedln]

Steph, you make a good point there. Do you think Clara should have refused Mr. Tiffany’s offer/challenge of the rapid windows?

Chpt. 34 –
Mr. Tiffany:  “The men refused to take it on, saying it was impossible.”

Clara:  "Oh ho! I knew how to work him, but he also knew how to work me. His exploitation was transparent, and his sheepish grin revealed that he knew I saw it, but I had ambition too, and he knew that as well."

When talking to the girls about the six windows  rush job –

Clara: "However, we have to continue to prove our skills.  A splendid opportunity to do that has been presented to me just now."

“There’ll be wigs on the green, Nellie, when your Patrick finds out,” Mary McVicar warned.

Chpt. 35
Nellie, “ Patrick said there was a big carrying-on.  Some were fiery mad, I guess and want to squeeze us dry.”

Clara: "That could mean trouble down the road.  I was surprised Mr. Tiffany hadn’t foreseen that this would pit us against one another."

If the girls knew it would cause problems, surely Clara knew also.  But I don't think she understood the power of unions, I don't think she anticipated that the men would actually try to close them down.  Until she learned that the men taking the windows was sanctioned by the union.  (Chpt. 37)

[pedln]

Descendant  --  one who descends, as offspring, however remotely; a blood relative.

We don't know if Clara ever had children, but I guess a descendant could be a niece or nephew?  She had three younger sisters.

Annie, in a NY Times article (above) it tells how a Driscoll descendant attended a lecture by Tiffany scholar Martin Eidelberg and afterwards told Eidelberg he had some letters written by Driscoll around the turn of the century.  And Vreeland explains on her website about another scholar who had access to some letters.  I think there were three scholars who eventually came together and pooled their new-found information.  It makes you wonder, doesn't it -- what if the descendant had decided to play golf or go to a ball game instead of attending Eidelberg's lecture.  Would we have ever known Clara?

I love the history that the author has weaved into the story -- like Dreiser's Sister Carrie, that Annie mentioned, and Hawthorne's granddaughter being a Tiffany girl.  And what about that chapter on the Flatiron Building.  Great line, George.  You know, that's only about three looooong blocks from Leo House.

Can anyone find Fourth Avenue?

[CallieOK]

On my map, Fourth Avenue starts in Lower Manhattan as Water Street - becomes St. James Place - then The Bowery - and turns into Fourth Avenue east of Washington Square Park.  Looks as if it runs into Union Square and then merges with Park Avenue.

[Steph]

Yes, my descendent line came from that interview. Interesting.. The letter saver was more likely to be a sister.. Clara does not strike me as a person who would save letters or anything else. She seems to have been a free spirit.
But I do  think she brought on the mens wrath and knew it. All for Mr. T... Who is more and more not a nice human being. He plays all of the women and they fall for it.

[pedln]

So where is 4th Avenue?  Callie’s got it right.  But I was getting so bugged -- Tiffany's was at Fourth Ave. and 25th Street

Fourth Avenue

And why did they change its name to Park. ?
Blame it on the railroads.

Today, Fourth Avenue is the shortest numbered north-south avenue in New York City. With its tilt athwart the other NYC avenues, it's also the only "north-south" numbered avenue in NYC that approximates true north. (You can prove it with a compass.) Just as the planet Pluto's orbit was shown to be out of alignment with the other eight planets, so Fourth Avenue is the joker in the deck of NYC north-south avenues.

As presently constituted, Fourth Avenue runs only a scant six blocks, between Astor Place on the south to East 14th Street and Union Square at the north. The short section between East 4th Street and Astor Place is designated by NYC street signs as being part of Cooper Square, and we'll hew to that designation here

.


More Fourth

I love New York history.

Am off for much the day.  Tomorrow we start/finsh the last implositve/explosive section.  Don't forget to read the Afterward.  Bring all your thougts, opinions, etc.

[ANNIE]

Well, of course, she had some descendants!  She had siblings who married and had children. Where is my thinking cap???   Lost and gone for now, it would seem!

I remember getting off the bus with you, Pedl'n at the corner of 5th Ave and 23rd St and there was the flatiron building.  We were very close to the Leo, which is at 23rd and 8th Ave.

And now, Steph, we have 4th Ave, the shortest avenue in NYC?  Is that right?  And the only one which is compass correct pointing north-to-south. 

I am a little behind in my reading and have been all week as we are dealing with the deaths of two of our older family members.  My husband's sister, Orlando resident, and his other sister's husband, Columbus resident, are finally at peace.   Trying to decide traveling to Orlando or not.  Plus trying to comfort the famliy members here and there.  Please forgive my tardiness in keeping up with the reading.

[Laura]

Joan asked:  “Just curious to hear whether you think that it was her position and freedom at Tiffany's that kept Clara from moving - or was it her relationship with Mr. T. that prevented her from accepting the job with Frederick Lamb, Laura?  I get the feeling that she is becoming more and more involved with her studio "girls" - even more so than with her own creative expression.  Do you sense that?  Of course, that doesn't explain her jealousy when she realized that her Mr. T is keeping company with Lillian and Alice at Corona...”

I rely on two quotes to help me understand Clara’s reason for staying at Tiffany.

“But, oh, how much more I like our spacious studio and all my Tiffany Girls than the bleak, cramped workshop at Lamb’s, where I would be the only woman.”  (pg. 247)

 “Was the need for recognition so vital that I would give up love in order to get it?  Had Mr. Tiffany injured me intentionally?”  No, I would not creep away just because he gave attention to others.  I would not leave without a fight, and my weapons were design ideas.”  (pg. 252)

Clara values her work space and the camaraderie with her fellow workers.  She would definitely lose both of those things if she accepted the new job.  She also values her ability to design, which would be equal in both jobs, but with recognition dangled as part of the position at Lamb’s.  In the end, she values the relationships with her coworkers more and vows to get the recognition she deserves at Tiffany’s.

Clara takes ownership of her department and its employees, so much that she calls her employees “my Tiffany Girls.”  She knows she is paving the way for women to compete directly with men in the workplace and that certainly is a factor in her staying with Tiffany.

Pedln asked:  “Laura, I agree.  And intermingled with the choices are her feelings about herself.  Is she self-absorbed?”

I don’t think Clara is self absorbed.  She considers her Tiffany Girls in her decision making about her new job.  I do think she has the luxury of being able to make choices for herself more so than other women of her generation since she is a well employed, independent, single woman and doesn’t really have to consider anyone other than herself.

[JoanP]

Laura - I appreciate your logical approach to the question of what makes Clara tick. I agree with you - I don't think she was self-absorbed either - from what she wrote in those letters. Where else would Susan V. have come up with this information.
I can't help but wonder how this story could have been told without those letters.  It makes me think about how letter-writing is nearly extinct.  What a source of history we are losing, without being aware of it now.  Our archival history is becoming so...diminished without such letters.  When was the last time you wrote a letter - not a card, or a note, but a real descriptive letter?

Wasn't it exciting reading about the Flatiron Building, Annie?   It was one of the first skyscrapers in New York because of its steel structure. I think it is the oldest one still standing.   The invention of the elevator must have been important for a 22 story building too.  What an amazing thing for Clara to have witnessed - and her letters must have described it to her family in the midwest.

I found this painting of the Flatiron by Ashcan Artist, John Sloan in 1906 - who lived in the neighborhood at the time.  Did Clara know him, I wonder?

Dust Storm, Fifth Avenue, 1906
John Sloan (American, 1871–1951)
Oil on canvas
 The Metropolitan Museum of Art