Program One
Welcome
Back
to 1899
"A
Taste of 1899" is Donna's tribute to the gilded age as America moved
west geographically, upward intellectually, and in circles morally. 1899
was a time of transition from rural to urban, from person-power to machine
power and from simple to complex. In the face of such progress, the old
styles of everything from medicine to corsets had to reinvent themselves
or fall out of fashion.
From the even greater complexity of The Second Millennium, many people long
to return to the first days of the twentieth century in its sweet simplicity.
Donna transports you back 117 years to give you a literary-flavored taste
of everyday Victorian life with all its problems and pleasures.
You will be able to see for yourself whether the turn of the last century
was a time of halcyon days or halitosis nights as you glimpse the lives
of ordinary people and relive the games and pastimes that gave the late
Victorians the first middle class of people with enough leisure to seek
diversions and entertainments.
About Mrs. McBustle..
To create this living portrait of a Victorian woman of a "certain" class and of a "certain" age, I have used more than three-hundred sources.
My goal is to celebrate the past as we of the present find ourselves in the second decade of the new millennium. I offer you a peek into everyday life among the energetic and influential "new" middle class.
Be warned that just as we take for granted the truth of the world as we know it, so did our ancestors. But their "truth" was very different from our own. Mrs. McB. sees life colored by the attitudes, superstitions, expectations and beliefs that framed her world--how could we expect her to do otherwise?
Mrs. McB., who believes herself to be up-to-date and progressive, seems quaintly humorous--not to mention ignorant and politically incorrect--to modern people. From four generations later, we may need to be a bit tolerant of her self-righteousness because we possess vast knowledge of science, medicine and the wonders of the electronic age that were hidden to her Victorian mind.
Program Three
No Footstomping or Tobacco Spitting Allowed
In
her presentation on music Donna leads the audience in song and dance through
the ten decades of popular music that reflect the boisterous exuberance and
the tragic turmoil of the 1800s. In the 19th Century the United States changed
dramatically as we swapped agricultural past for mechanized future while we
multiplied in population fourteen times and expanded in land mass by eleven
times.
Somehow we survived continuous strife including four major wars. We put away
forever the barbarism of slavery. Popular song and dance in the 19th century,
true to all music for all times, gave us common humanity to ease our sorrow
and celebrate our common joy.
Come back with me to 1899. In Mrs. McB's world, for well-to-do city folks, electric lights were just beginning to replace gas jets--which had only twenty years earlier replaced candles and kerosene lamps.
Hers was a time when the earliest child labor laws reduced the working day for children under twelve years of age to a mere 10 hours a day. Smoke from coal-fired factories so blackened the air that residents had to use artificial light at high noon on a sunny day. Local streets were flowing or rutted mud for three-fourths of every year.
Shopgirls made 6 cents an hour. Trousers were called "Unwhisperables." Dr. John Harvey Kellogg of Battle Creek, Michigan, invented cornflakes in 1896 because he believed that a bland diet would reduce unhealthy sexual desire. Candy makers used arsenic to color their confections green, and morphine was the key ingredient used to calm tots in Winslow's Baby Syrup. Welcome back to 1899.
And
now, Mrs. McB has prepared a program especially for gardeners. Mrs. McB hopes
your garden club will invite this Victorian Grande Dame to entertain your
garden club with her...
Program Two
Secrets of Love and Beauty from the Victorian Garden
Before plastic surgery, before botox, before Helena Rubenstein and Estee Lauder were---? Mrs. McB knows and would be delighted to share her wisdom with your group. Let Mrs. McBustle suggest old uses for your horticultural harvest which you are apt to find quite new and perhaps a bit shocking. Return to the days before the turn of the Twentieth Century and the fables, foibles and fun of an earlier era. You may even discover what Oscar Wilde meant in A Woman of No Importance when he wrote, The Book of Life begins with a man and a woman in a Garden. It ends with "Revelations."
Come Frolic on the Fringe of FEAR !
Follow the Red Horseman link to learn about a delightfully deft and daffy discourse on The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. And what a deal! During these days when everyone is looking for a bargain, Mrs. McBustle throws in a fifth horseman for free. You don't even need a money-saving coupon.