Exhibition
Money Talks: The Gilded Age in Fairfield
| February 10, 2024 — June 16, 2024 | |
| South Gallery |
Immigrant labor and innovative businessmen. Domestic servants and wealthy vacationers. Growing public need and local benefactors. Dichotomies characterize the Gilded Age in Fairfield. The “Gilded Age” (1865-1912) was a period of immense growth in America known for lavish expressions of wealth and cavernous class distinctions. In 1873, Mark Twain gave the era its name with the novel, The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today. Tremendous social and economic changes could also be found in Fairfield—changes that would not have been possible without the working class supporting the grand lifestyle of the upper classes.
This exhibition presents the industrialists, philanthropists, and entrepreneurs who summered in the Fairfield area, including P.T. Barnum, Annie Burr and Oliver Gould Jennings, Dr. Ira DeVer Warner, and Jonathan and Harriet V.S. Thorne, alongside the people who made their lifestyles possible.
Exhibition-Related Events & Programs
February 14, 2024 | 12 – 1 pm | History Bites | Evolution of the Wedding Gown
April 3, 2024 | 10 am – 4 pm | Pop-Up Display in the Research Library
April 20, 2024 | 10 – 11 am | Gallery Tour: The Gilded Age
May 19, 2024 | 2 – 4 pm | The Mansion’s Gilded Age Tea
Image: Postcard of Sunnieholme and its gardens, c. 1910-1930. Fairfield Museum Postcard Collection.
