Miss Alice Austen and Staten Island’s Gilded Age
by Bonnie Yochelson

When Alice was coming of age, outdoor leisure activities were the lifeblood of Staten Island’s elite society, which the press sometimes referred to as "the sporting society set.” As clubs devoted to boating, hunting, cricket and tennis proliferated, Staten Island’s young people enjoyed unprecedented opportunities for chaperone-free socializing, and women began wearing less confining clothing, which allowed them to move more freely.

Athletics and social events were intimately intertwined, and Alice’s scrapbooks are full of invitations to tennis tournaments, hunt breakfasts, dinner parties, dances and musicales. The press covered these events in detail, usually naming Alice “Austin” (misspelled more often than not) among the attendees and sometimes mentioning what she was wearing.

Alice (center) and her friends, sisters Caroline (known as Carrie) and Violet Ward, pose for the camera before going swimming at Clear Comfort. Their linen or cotton bathing costumes—blouses, skirts and bloomers—were cumbersome in the water. Alice’s short-sleeved outfit, while less modest, made swimming easier.

An elderly Alice Austen told an interviewer that as a child she was inclined to be “fat.” “But I ran it off. I played tennis from almost the first day I could walk.” There was a tennis court laid out on the grounds of Clear Comfort, and in 1880, the women of her neighborhood formed the Ladies’ Tennis Club of Clifton.

For several years, the club played at Fort Wadsworth, a half-hour walk from Clear Comfort. In this group portrait, Alice (standing) and Trude Eccleston pose with four officers stationed there.

The Staten Island Ladies’ Club, founded in 1877, spearheaded women’s competitive tennis in the United States, and in the early 1880s, Alice distinguished herself as a top competitor. In 1889, the New York Herald described Alice’s play:  

Miss Alice Austen, of Clifton, is a tennis player of more than average ability, and has gained considerable reputation by her game. That she has her heart thoroughly in the game is apparent every time she lifts her racquet, and by many she is considered the most painstaking player on the island.

Despite the limitations of her camera equipment, Alice stood courtside to capture the excitement of play and the casual languor of the crowds.

In 1886, the men of the Staten Island Baseball and Cricket Club built a clubhouse for the Ladies’ Club on their grounds. In May, the Ladies’ Club held a “Kirmess,” or festival, to raise funds for furnishings and a gift to thank the men. The festival highlight was a dance demonstration in five styles: Dutch, Spanish, Gypsy, Dresden China and “Tennis.” Alice took this self-portrait in her Spanish costume.

Alice took this photograph of Mamie Marsh, Julia Marsh Lord’s sister, attending jumping contests and pony races at the recently formed Richmond County Country Club. The New York Times reported, “Over two thousand spectators were present, including many prominent society people from this city and Staten Island.”

The annual Charity Ball for the benefit of the S.R. Smith Infirmary, Staten Island’s charity hospital, was the most prestigious society event of the year. In 1894, Alice photographed herself and her escort, Lewis Austen, leaving for the ball. Five years younger than Alice, Lewis was her mother’s first cousin and a good friend. The harsh flash of the camera startled the otherwise debonair couple.

Alice collected programs from the ball and many similar events, sketching in seating arrangements, and noting on her dance cards—fully filled in by her partners—the time she returned home, usually between one and three o’clock in the morning. 

<< View The Art and Craft of Photography

©2021 Text by Bonnie Yochelson