From Denmark to the Cariboo by Linda Peterat

Author:Linda Peterat
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Heritage House
Published: 2022-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

Permanent guests listed at the Palace Hotel and published in The Elite Directory in 1879 were “Mr. and Mrs. S. Bates.” In the United States, Asahel Sumner Bates usually used Sumner Bates as his name. Caroline and Sumner had achieved recognition as part of San Francisco’s elite class.

The Elite Directory gave instructions to the elite and aspiring elite in San Francisco and Oakland through a large section on etiquette that included topics such as “Introductions,” “Visiting and Visiting Cards for Ladies,” “Dinners and Dining Out,” and “Theatre Etiquette.” This directory was followed in 1884 by The Social Manual of San Francisco and Oakland. The manual included the usual listings of elite citizens, clubs, and their members and a section entitled “Rules of Good Breeding” that replaced the section on etiquette. The topics covered in the “Rules” section included “Riding and Driving,” “The Toothpick,” “Smart Sayings,” “How to Please,” “In the Carriage,” and “Etiquette in Church.”

Caroline found both The Elite Directory and The Social Manual to be important guidebooks in determining what mattered in the Oakland and San Francisco societies. The Elite Directory was explicit in describing the society founded in the pioneer frontier gold-rush era and having earlier Spanish and Indigenous roots. In the 1840s, “The city was full of bright, intellectual, energetic people. Most of them were young, hopeful and romantic. Their social intercourse had the polish of older communities, mingled with the dash and freedom of the frontier.”104

During the “second epoch” of social history in San Francisco, “there lived several ladies of superior accomplishments who would have adorned the society of any city in the world . . . Manners were becoming more formal, though they still had a freedom not usual in eastern cities.” The Elite Directory described the many new neighbourhoods, the wealth being accumulated by some families, the splendid homes being built, and “every part of the city has a tinge of gentility.” It cautioned, “Fashion should never aim to exist for itself alone, and it always has at hand the means of uniting polite social intercourse with mutual improvement and the amelioration of the ills that afflict humanity.”105 Both books were implicitly directed at women and provided explicit instruction for the elite and aspiring elite on the essential practices for a cultured and civilized society in San Francisco.

Caroline’s marriage to Charles assured her a secure position among the nouveau riche of the San Francisco area. Charles was born June 1, 1825, in Manchester, England. He arrived in California at age twenty-four in 1849 and became a citizen of the United States in 1853. For twenty years he lived in San Francisco, where he married Alithea Rose and worked as a bay pilot, merchant, and ferry skipper. In 1868, he and Alithea became one of the founding families of Sausalito when a consortium of nineteen San Francisco businessmen pooled resources to buy 471 hectares (1,164 acres) of the Rancho Sausalito and create a townsite. He was an original investor and president of the Sausalito Land and Ferry Company.

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