Working men's club

“ In the first place, it should contain two or three well-known men to act as figureheads, their names being a guarantee for the social standing of the club. In the second, one or two members ought to be thoroughly conversant with business matters, and well fitted to deal with the details of club finance. And, lastly, a certain proportion of its members ought to be men well in touch with the life of the club, and therefore thoroughly acquainted with its needs. ”

“ Any club manager can tell of cases, lots of them, in which the club has been the stepping-stone of the boy to a useful career. In some cases the boys, having outgrown their club, have carried on the work unaided and organized young men’s societies on a plane of in-door respectability that has raised an effectual barrier against the gang and its club-room, the saloon. These things show what a hold the idea has upon the boy and how much more might be made of it. So far, private benevolence has had the field to itself, properly so ”

“ On the whole, they are a most civil class of men, and for this reason thoroughly deserve the 173Christmas subscription which serves as a sort of gigantic, but quite justifiable, tip. This is a comparatively new institution. It must be realized that club servants are not overpaid, and when upon duty their work is particularly severe. The electric bells never cease ringing until the club closes; every member expects his wants to command immediate attention, and not a few are capricious and exacting. ”

“ It is, indeed, men of moderate means rather than the very rich who use a club most, and who are therefore its principal support. Millionaires and financiers seldom spend much in their clubs, for, possessed of highly trained chefs and luxurious houses, they have naturally little temptation to spend their spare time elsewhere. ”

“ The charity of the club, is also extended beyond the grave, and terminates with a present to the widow.
The philosophers tell us, "There is no good without its kindred evil." This amiable body of men, therefore, marshalled to expel disease, hath one small alloy, and perhaps but one. As liquor and labour are inseparable, the imprudent member is apt to forget to quit the club room when he has spent his necessary two-pence, but continues there to the injury of his family. ”

“ Now this alternating between Club and Café spoils men utterly. It engenders the worst possible style—a double manner. The over-stiffness here and the over-ease there are alike faulty.
The great, the fatal defect of all foreign Clubs is, the existence of some one, perhaps two tyrants, who, by loud talk, swagger, an air of presumed superiority and affectation of “knowing the whole thing,” browbeat and ride rough-shod over all their fellows. ”

“ And that is always something. In an age when clubs are really almost universal, most men have had occasion to wish that their society would sit occasionally on some of the members. The member who bullies the servants is a not uncommon specimen of the p. 115club-bore. He may be called the bore truculent. He has been excellently caricatured by Thackeray in the “Book of Snobs.”
There we have the club-bore who makes such a fuss about his chop, and scolds the waiter so terribly. “Look at it, sir; is it a chop for a gentleman? Smell it, sir; is it fit to put on a club table?” ”

“ The Tory patrician belonged to White’s; the Whig politician of old family was a member of Brooks’s; the country gentleman put his name down at Boodle’s or Arthur’s; the distinguished lawyer, divine, or man of letters, became a member of the Athenæum; and the soldier, who was a field officer, of the United Service. The membership of such clubs constituted an exclusive circle.
A club was a place in which men wrote letters and met their friends. ”

“ For the success of a Club you need a number of men perfectly incapable of all life save such as the Club supplies; who repair to the Club, not alone to dine and smoke and sup, and read their paper, but to interchange thought in that blended half-confidence that the Club imparts ”

“ When the pioneer women's club of New York was started, a club that aspired to be in the same class as the most important men's club, various governors of the latter were unflatteringly outspoken; women could not possibly run a club as it should be run—it was unthinkable that they should be foolish enough to attempt it! And the husbands and fathers of the founders expected to have to dig down in their pockets to make up the deficit; forgetting entirely that the running of a club is merely the running of a house on a large scale, and that women, not men, are the perfect housekeepers. ”

“ Of all places in the world, a club is the surest focus of speculation. You meet gentlemen there who hold stock in every line in the kingdom—directors, committee-men, and even crack engineers. I defy you to continue an altogether uninterested auditor of the fascinating intelligence of Mammon. ”

“ You seem to imagine that I want to be flattered, like a man, by being asked to explain things. I told you, didn’t I? that Jack and I quarreled about his membership in a new club. Very well, I too, have decided to join a club!”
“Humph, that isn’t a bad idea. But what kind of a club? An Ibsen or a Browning one, I suppose. I notice that men dislike particularly to have us members of really intellectual clubs.” ”

“ The thought of seeing “her” miserable and their children hungry whilst he himself is helpless to assist, must always be one of the most harrowing things to a careful young artisan, with visions of a happy little home in the near future. There is, however, another view of the club which appeals with almost equal force to our young artisan just out of his apprenticeship and finding himself in possession of an income nearly double that to which he has been accustomed. The Trade Union Meeting House is the recognised club for the men in the craft, and thus presents many social attractions. ”

“ Nay, the tendency to extreme self-respect which hesitated to join in a club was running rapidly down to abject admiration of each other, when the club was broken up by new combinations.
The use of the hospitality of the club hardly needs explanation. Men are unbent and social at table ”

“ Just as there are two sportsmen’s societies, so there are two clubs—two rival clubs, known, quite properly, as the Union Club and the Peace Club, where every evening, before dinner, the half-pay captains and the retired merchants come to play whist at a penny a point. The members are kindly men, honest and peaceful; but there is not one of them who is not firmly convinced that any other club but his own is the resort of ill-bred fellows, not fit associates for himself or his friends. ”

“ The motto of this club should have been, “All men must die, therefore all men should dine.” If the club’s proceedings showed no lack of invention and mother wit, we still should very much doubt their efficacy toward achieving the avowed end and aim of the club’s existence, for surely such extravagances could have no other effect than to raise a laugh. ”

“ When next the street-boy sorrowfully exclaims on your passing that 'it's no wonder the barbers all 'list for soldiers,' or some puny idiot at your club—a lilliputian model of popular 'manhood'—sniggers to his friend behind his coffee as you come in: call to mind pictures of certain brave 'tailed men' of old, at the winking of whose eyelid your tiny club 'man' would have expired on the instant. ”

“ Let us even say, masculine contacts: for the first task of any philosopher being to simplify his problem so that he can examine it clearly and with less distraction, the Club makes a great and drastic purge by sweeping away altogether the enigmatic and frivolous sex and disregarding it, at any rate during the hours of convivial session. The Club is troubled to note that in the intolerable rabies and confusion of this business life men meet merely in a kind of convulsion or horrid passion of haste and perplexity. ”

“ They are poorer, but are more generous in giving invitations to tea or a meal. Men’s clubs are full of old women, and women’s clubs full of young men, nowadays.
A club is also a boon to the married woman, for there are days when country relations arrive in town, when, for instance, the sweep has been ordered at home; then the country or foreign friends can be taken to the club, and need not know that their hostess’s small household cannot tackle a luncheon because of the advent of the sweep. ”

“ If you told the men at the club that such and such a thing was religion they’d most of ’em kick like the deuce; but when they get the thing without explanation they take to it every time. But you were asking me about my connection with the club. It began four years ago, when they first got into Miss Smedley’s house. ”

“ Of late years, however, a less severe tone has prevailed amongst its members, many of whom are distinguished men.
144Sixty years ago the fact of club membership implied some social position or distinction on the part of the individual. White’s, Brooks’s, Boodle’s, Arthur’s, and a few other establishments, constituted really exclusive clubland, and to be elected to them was a matter of no little difficulty. A man of obscure birth, or one unknown to the committee, would have been sure of being blackballed. ”

“ A New York friend who once spent a week with Rodney Merriam in Seminary Square said on leaving that the house was as good as a club; that the only thing he had missed was the signing of checks for what he ordered. Men regard a club as paradise brought to earth, not because they escape there from things feminine or can command a cool siphon by ringing a bell; but because they like full swing at a club kitchen. It is a heart-breaking thing in any man’s life when he knows to a moral certainty that the roast on Monday, week after week, will be beef ”

“ It is a social club, commonly called a dive, convenient for the high times of a certain group. The men are unskilled laborers during the day, and in the evenings they round up their girls or else meet them at the rendezvous in order to have what they consider and enjoy as a good time. ”

“ Men thinking of joining the club became aware of the fate which might befall them, and so in time the reputation of more than one club for extreme exclusiveness has led from dire necessity to the other extreme of letting in almost anyone willing to join. ”

“ IF any man loves comfort and has little cash to buy it, he
Should get into a crowded club—a most select society,—
While solitude and mutton-cutlets serve infelix uxor, he
May have his club, like Hercules, and revel there in luxury.
Yes, clubs knock taverns on the head. E’en Hatchett’s can’t demolish ’em;
Joy grieves to see their magnitude, and Long longs to abolish ’em.
The Inns are out. Hotels for single men scarce keep alive on it,
While none but houses that are in the family way thrive on it. ”

“ Do not take dogs into club-rooms; they are liable to destroy furniture, and everyone may not appreciate them as much as you do.
Morning dress is worn at the club. In the evening a dress suit may be worn if desired, but morning costume is equally appropriate. Hats should be removed at luncheon or dinner.
Gentlemen will refrain from much mentioning of the names of ladies while in the club-rooms, or from indulging in scandal. Serious ill-feeling is often aroused in this manner. Many men refuse to listen to anything of the kind, and will retire if any such subject is brought up. ”

“ Clive began to drop in at his clubs again. One was a Whipper-Snapper Club to which young Manhattan aspired when freshly released from college; the others were of the fashionable and semi-fashionable sort, tedious, monotonous, full of the aimless, the idle, or [Pg 137] of that bustling and showy smartness which is perhaps even less admirable and less easy to endure.
Men destitute of mental resources and dependent upon others for their amusement, disillusioned men, lazy men, socially ambitious men, men gluttonously or alcoholically predisposed haunted these clubs. ”

“ We earn our dimes like the horse or ox, we toil like the fabled steer, and then we journey a dozen blocks to blow in the dimes for beer. While the women work at the washing tub to add to our scanty hoard, we happily meet at the poor man's club, where never a soul is bored. We recklessly squander our minted brawn, and the clubhouse owner thrives; and we'll homeward go at the break of dawn and joyously beat our wives. ”

“ Given sincerity, and that vague but essential quality called personality, in the leaders, we do not care very much what the programme of a club may be. I have never known a club leader possessing these qualifications who did not get out of the experience as much as it was possible to give, if not more. An interest in basic social problems develops naturally out of the club relationship. Housing conditions, immigration, unemployment, minimum wage, political control, labor unions, are no longer remote and academic. ”

“ The larger the club the less compact its life and its influence,—what a few men have gained the club has lost. The tendency toward disintegration is confirmed by a peculiarity of the organization of the societies. The first half of the members of the Institute form a separate club, the D. K. E., or Dickey. From this the second half are excluded, becoming a sort of social fringe; they often form a part of the mob that dines at Memorial or of the cliques that dine in boarding-houses, and are only a shade less excluded than the rest from the centres of the college life. ”