Terrific book about the nearly forgotten suffragists, without whom the 19th Amendment may have never happened. I will be using this book in my classes. Highly recommend. The writing is excellent and the research is put together in a great way.

When I think of women’s suffrage, the mental picture that came to mind was of working class women persecuted in their fight for the vote. This author takes the time to examine the wealthy and rich socialites who fought to give all women the right to vote. It was eye opening to me to learn the risks these women took by using the clout and power they had, as well as the criticism and pushback they experienced. As more and more restrictions are placed on voting across the US, I think this is an important work in the understanding of fighting for suffrage, how to be an ally, and how those who have social power can and should use it. This novel was excellent in opening my eyes to a period of history that I was not as familiar with.

Thank you to NetGalley who provided a copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

The image of the suffragette marching with her homemade sign on the city streets is only part of the story of women's fight for the vote. Movements must usually attract powerful influencers to succeed, and that is the story of the wealthy and influential women who threw their considerable social (and actual) currency behind the fight for women's rights. The individuals are fascinating, though knowing just how much wealth plays a part in these sorts of battles is frustrating, or at least something that makes me feel very ambivalent. A well-researched and engaging read.

A fascinating read and a must to anyone interested in women gaining the vote, equality or gender history. I never tire of reading about this period which in the grand scheme of things wasn't that long ago.

There’s been much emphasis in the UK this year (2018) about the fight for women’s suffrage, so this excellent book is a timely reminder that American women too were fighting for the right to vote. Here the author concentrates on the richest and most privileged women in New York, of whom many espoused the cause and put their considerable fortunes plus their influence and position into fighting for it. They were sometimes accused of merely taking up the cudgels because it was the fashionable thing to do and a distraction from their otherwise vacuous lives. But these were capable, intelligent women and there seems little doubt that they believed in right of women to vote. As well as looking at the individual women themselves – many of them household names even today, Astor, Vanderbilt, Tiffany and so on – Neuman examines the political and social background against which they operated, which makes the book an extremely informative, entertaining and comprehensive piece of social history. Highly recommended.

Although not the most well known of the suffragist movement, they are nonetheless critical to the history of women's rights. Although it feels strange to be touting a book about the social elite's place in history given the current massive divide in social classes, their contribution deserves to be acknowledged. Well written and researched, an important part of history is put in the spotlight.

4.5 gilded and glittering stars!

"The men will see that the women will laugh last, and he who laughs last laughs best, you know."

Yet again, I put off reading a book (as I sometimes do, for no apparent reason whatsoever), only to have finished it and LOVED it! What was I thinking putting this one off for so long?!? I feel so ashamed!

Neuman clearly knew what she was talking about when she wrote Gilded Suffragists; it is so incredibly thorough and well-researched - traits I always adore seeing in books that I read. It was astounding how much work she put into it. I'm totally in awe!

The concept behind this book is what caught my attention and had me requesting it - the idea that New York City's most elite women (Neuman credits around 200) used their keen senses of fashion and large bank accounts to attract public attention to the suffrage movement is incredible!

These wealthy women were not regarded by men as equal citizens, so, they reasoned, they were exempt from following the laws in the same way that men were, even if that meant using drastic measures every now and then...like shouting on street corners and from atop soap boxes, or picketing outside the front gates of the White House, all of which were incredibly unladylike things to be caught doing in the early 1900s.
Interestingly, American women fought hard to keep themselves separate from their English counterparts - despite the fact that both groups were fighting for the exact same thing - for fear that American men would be put off and feel emasculated (gasp!) if their women adopted the same extreme tactics that British women were using to draw attention to suffrage (including assaulting members of Parliament, cutting telephone wires, and treating golf courses with acid). The majority of American women felt that their "Deeds, not words" slogan would be sufficient in winning them the right to vote. Whether this is actually true or whether it was their eventual escalation to picketing, imprisonment, and hunger strikes that won them the vote, win it they did.

These 200-ish women manipulated the press into featuring the suffrage movement in some of the country's most prominent newspapers. In fact, these very women are credited with starting the paparazzi-style reporting that is still going strong today: "At a time when print was ascending, these elite women of an earlier generation rode the crest of a new phenomenon called celebrity journalism." These gilded suffragists understood all too well that for the right price, the public would learn what it needed to about their work as suffrage advocates...and none of what it didn't. They used their lofty positions atop the social ladder to bring attention to a cause that spoke to them on a very deep level. And most importantly, they learned to play the game - and win the vote - by adopting a few male-approved tactics; charm, social connections, money, and, when necessary, a bit of arm-twisting.

After reading Gilded Suffragists, I am much more familiar with suffrage and what it meant for these women to stand on the right side of a very wrong time in history. Marriages dissolved, children grew resentful, friendships broke apart, and reputations were smeared, but these women fought valiantly for a cause that was undeniably important to them. They wanted to ensure that they would leave the world a more tolerant place than when they had entered it.

I am upset that the issues this book addresses are not taught in history classes today. If children were familiar with the suffrage movement and just how important it was, they might not take such things for granted because these women (whatever their motives for winning the vote might have been) were brilliant, brave, and remarkable, to say the least, and it's a damn shame that this part of history is not common knowledge today.

This book makes me proud to be a woman, and I'd like to think that I would have picked up a banner or handful of pamphlets and marched right alongside these women had I been alive during that era.

Neuman truly knocked it out of the park when she wrote Gilded Suffragists.
Take a chance on this one...you won't be disappointed!



*A copy of this book was provided by NetGalley, the publisher, and the author in exchange for an honest review.*

Today’s Women’s Marchers owe a lot to Johanna Neuman’s Gilded Suffragists. There’s no doubt that high society at the turn of the twentieth century was the precursor of today’s activist celebrities. I just wish Neuman’s book had been more compelling.

The women’s suffrage and enfranchisement movements weren’t moving forward very quickly until the women of means started to participate. These were women who understood how to manage the media of time. They also had the backing—if only financially—of wealthy husbands and families. Their social lives gave them access to both local and national politicians as well.

Despite those advantages, the suffragists didn’t unite together behind one banner. They created various separate committees and organizations. Then the groups wasted energy fighting with each other instead of just against the patriarchy. I was incredibly frustrated by the factions, which stalled and derailed the process. Yet somehow, they managed to pull it off. Women became fully voting U.S. citizens.

To me, the story as Neuman tells it isn’t that they accomplished their goal in spite of male opposition. It is that they accomplished their goal in spite of themselves.

The book’s tone and structure frustrated me. Most of the book felt like a recitation of facts, with only a minor bit of sociological interpretation in the last several pages. Neuman chose not to include much supposed dialogue among the suffragists, gilded or otherwise. I understand the author’s desire to stay strictly historical, but this can be done artfully as well as accurately. For example, the way Holly Tucker did in City of Light, City of Poison.

Neuman built the story chronologically. And yet, I often felt that the same facts were introduced as new in multiple places. I never quite connected with any of the women involved, despite the information I learned about them. And the various factions only added to my frustration. I wish the book’s organization had focused on fewer women, or had followed committee lines instead of timelines. Perhaps another style would have made it seem less like a doctoral dissertation.

Nevertheless, I was glad to learn about the participation of these women in a cause that has defined the way American women contribute to politics. Kudos to Neuman for bringing them to the forefront.

Thanks to NetGalley, New York University Press, and the author for a digital ARC in exchange for this honest review.

Terrific telling of such an interesting time in our history.

in her 240 pages long book the Gilded suffragist, Johanna Neumann tries to bring light to the American upper-crust women who fought for women's right the foremost of course the right to vote. To distinguish themselves from the British suffragettes they chose to be called suffragists as they were determined to choose other methods. These women used their own means to move the cause forward like easy access to important people, use their own publicity to introduce the topic to a wider audience and use their money in many ways to support women's rights. The time spans from 1907 till 1947 and the book describes many of these upper class women contributed to the cause. It brings a wealth of details not sparing the infighting or rivalry among various branches of women rights clubs or parties and how often the women lacked solidarity. the book is an interesting read for all who want to get an insight into the women rights movement and at the same time how society functioned at that time and at that higher class level. What is not so perfect is that the chapters at times lack cohesiveness and the book seems not well organized. It is also distracting that the author finds it necessary to describe in details the costs of table settings, room decoration and of clothes of these upper-class women. Nevertheless, it is a good read for the wealth of information and brings the other side of suffragists who are rarely if ever mentioned.

This was a very dry book, and started off with the rather dull beginning of clubs. It is interesting to know our history, it is just very difficult to relate to women born with a silver spoon in their mouths. And with the writing style being so dry, I am surprised I finished it.

3.75

Fascinating anecdotal account of the overlooked support for women's suffrage by a daunting number of wealthy socialites in the early 20th century. Sadly, the movement was as partisan and factionalized as any political group and many of the "gilded" women were erased when history was written. The individual stories are often dramatic and note worthy and this account sheds some light on a lesser known time and some significant participants.

I was given an ARC via Net Galley in return for my honest review.

This was an interesting look at some of the most famous women of the era and how their popularity helped the suffragist cause.

Gilded Suffragists The New York Socialites who Fought for Women's Right to Vote by Johanna Neuman in bookstores these days is a wonderful book. If you are a woman you must read it. It's very clear, bubbling, entertaining and plenty of informations, book, dreaming in some part, but mostly, while you will read it, you will "live" the sensation of being transported thanks to the light, sunny writing-style of the author at the beginning of 1900s.
It's a story of women this one and of women of the best and most influential families of NYC, the richest part, wonderfully "painted" and described.
There are the Astor, Belmont, Harriman, Tiffany, Vanderbilt, Rockefeller, including many intellectual great names and of course the creative women and girls working in the city, for a total of more than 200 girls and ladies all ready for starting the suffrage movement.
A trip in the past but also in that rights so forgotten and neglected. If we are more free is also thanks to these women.
An anecdotes for all: problems like the sinking of the Titanic was in 192, didn't create just polemics because of the lack of sufficient lifeboats but also because most men left their place to a lot of women and children with a profound discussion between the various parts.
John J. Astor IV died in April 12 with other 1503 other souls.
He accompanied his pregnant wife to a lifeboat leaving her alone because the motto was is and always will be: "Women and children before" and then he died. When the Titanic sank.
Some men asked: "Would the suffragette have stood on that deck for women's rights or for women's privileges?"

Read it: it's a wonderful tale, plenty of informations, funny, electrifying. You'll just adore it!

I thank NetGalley and NY University Press for this eBook.

Gilded Suffragists describes the effects of the society women who joined the women's suffrage movement. This was very well-researched, citing many ignored contemporary articles. It also provided many nice moments, such as the anecdote about the woman reciprocating the dinner at the club line to the people who did it to her. While well researched and occasionally touching, this book would go off on long tangents, like on the methods of the movement and the men in the movement, which were interesting but not the focus, making the book seem disorganised. Additionally, at certain points, the book turned into lists of salons hosted by society women, which could have been mentioned together rather than expounding on everyone of them.

A digital copy of this book was provided by NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

Subtitled, The New York Socialites Who Fought for Women's Right to Vote, Johanna Neuman's book credits the forgotten women of the upper class who joined the movement for suffrage.

Just as today the media loves wealth and beauty, a hundred years ago the media loved the elite denizens of New York, helping to establish the power of the 'celebrity endorsement.'

When socialites decided to form their own club, become involved with the betterment of the immigrant and the poor, and support women's right to self-government, they provided much-needed funding and a public voice from within the establishment.

They thought it important to be well dressed and feminine to counter the stereotype of suffragettes as masculine or hysterical. Some took to soap boxes while others held elegant soirees. The women publicly paraded in white with banners, an act of nonconformity that brought ridicule and angry threats. Eventually, enlightened men supported their wives, marching with them, while others' disapproving husbands sat grimly on the sidelines.

WWI had a huge impact on the movement. The Suffragists were criticized for drawing the president's attention away from the war, and it was then that they became targets of police brutality and inhumane treatment in prison.

I was moved by the story of Jeanette Rankin, a pacifist Montana Republican and the first women elected to the U.S. Congress. When President Wilson asked Congress to approve entering WWI, Rankin was under huge pressure. Should she stand by her pacifist beliefs? Or, representing all women and their political future, must she prove that women could rise to the occasion and support war when circumstances required it?

When Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony published their History of Woman Suffrage they omitted or distorted the history of the movement, emphasizing their own roles as founders. Over the years, the Gilded Suffragettes were relegated to the sidelines of history and then were forgotten.

Neuman locates the movement in the history of the early 20th c., a time of great social change, including the establishment of the federal income tax, laws overseeing business, and population shifts from rural to urban areas.

I finished this book August 18; it was on August 18, 1920, that the 19th Amendment was passed. In some ways, women have come a long way, and yet our rights for self-determination and political and equality are under threat. A hundred years ago society's darlings, dressed in couture fashions and big hats, stood up for social equality. I would like to know, are today's women of the 1% as willing or interested in standing up for political equality? Or is it only the new class of elites from the entertainment business that have the courage?

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

This book was such a learning experience for me. I was not aware of these brave women who used their place in society to fight for women's rights and improve the world. I also liked reading about the men that supported these women. Some of them even joined in the fight with these courageous women. This is one of my favorite topics to read about, and the author did not disappoint. I could tell it was well researched and it was also very readable. I loved it! Highly recommend!

A big thank you to Johanna Neuman, Washington Mews Press, and Netgalley for the copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review.

In the days when New York circulated over 20 daily newspapers and birth control was an arrestable offense, women named Astor, Rockefeller, and Vanderbilt along with the likes of Katherine Hepburn's mother bonded in the fight to win the women's vote.

In the shadow of the days of the fin de siecle women were viewed as emotional, weak vessels with the home as their domain. But as a certain class made the climb to celebrity inspiration drew the together to create The Colony Club on Madison Avenue, a social society with its own building housing a running track, a restaurant, bedrooms, and holding enrichment programs for its members, which was capped at 700. As these ladies became more civically-minded their talks leaned toward the suffrage movement.
These women reminded me of the mother in Mary Poppins. A lovely, engaging personality who couldn't do more for society could not be found than one of these ladies. So respected were they that they won the respect of thousands of men who also fought for the cause.

Neumann explores history with an unclouded eye in this book. These women were not perfect and often made headlines, but they certainly weren't the violent types of Great Britain. The rights of all females were based upon the movement of yesteryear. Neuman does an excellent job informing the reader how indebted we are to these brave souls.

I felt that this book was very well written and worth my time in reading. I have always had an interest in the suffragist movement and this helped remind me why.

In the superb 2004 HBO film ‘Iron Jawed Angels’, Molly Parker plays Mrs Emily Leighton, the wife of Senator Tom Leighton. When the film begins Emily, in line with the doctrine of the separate spheres, regards politics as her husband’s realm and contents herself with supporting him and bringing up their two daughters. Gradually, though, she takes more of an interest in the suffragist cause. At first her support is financial but gradually she becomes more radical and more active, even joining those women who picketed Wilson’s White House and as a consequence is imprisoned, and goes on hunger strike.

The character of Emily Leighton is fictional but Johanna Neuman’s book ‘Gilded Suffragists’, subtitled ‘The New York Socialites who fought for women’s right to vote’ tells the actual story of those upper class women who lent their support, albeit in much less dramatic ways than Emily, to the campaign for votes for women, which eventually triumphed when women gained the right to vote in federal elections in 1920, as a result of the 19th Amendment.

According to Neuman it was over 200 socialites, including “women named Astor, Belmont, Harriman, Mackay, Rockefeller, Tiffany, Vanderbilt, and Whitney” who made a decisive contribution to that constitutional change when, in 1908, they reanimated the suffrage cause by exploiting their social status to ‘de-toxify’ and normalize it.

This celebrity endorsement was, it is claimed, so potent - ultimately helping to “push women’s suffrage over the finish line” - because these women had the ear of the media and because their glamour undermined the anti-suffragist taunt that women who demanded their rights were somehow ‘unfeminine’ and threatened the emasculation of men.

Neuman is an award-winning journalist turned historian and ‘Gilded Suffragists’, her second book, represents a revised version of her doctoral dissertation. It is a great pity that the Colony Club, which was founded in 1907 as the first exclusive women’s club in New York City, and which plays a central part in Neuman’s account, refused her access to its archives. She nevertheless makes a strong case for her claim that the gilded suffragists in general and Vira Boarman Whitehouse and Alva Vanderbilt Belmont in particular, made a key financial and cultural contribution to gaining women the vote only to be “methodically airbrushed from the metanarrative of women’s suffrage”.

Neuman writes with great verve and her general analysis, notably of the relationship between Carrie Chapman Catt’s NAWSA and Alice Paul’s National Woman’s Party, is astute. Above all, she deserves praise for shedding light on a topic which has hitherto been neglected.

Having said all that, a nagging doubt remains. If History is written by the winners and the gilded suffragists played such a decisive role in winning women the vote, then why did they need rescuing from oblivion by Neuman? For such supposed mistresses of media manipulation they seem ultimately to have missed a rather major trick.