The Real-Life Socialites Who Inspired The Gilded Age
glamour.comThe Gilded Age characters and their real-life counterparts, below.Julian Fellowes doesn’t mask the true identity of Donna Murphy's character in The Gilded Age: Mrs.
Astor was, indeed, a real person, and the queen bee of New York society. Although other women had the same family name, there was only one who was considered the Mrs.
Astor: Caroline Schermerhorn. Frank Crowninshield, a Vogue society writer who knew Mrs. Astor, described her power as “absolute” and “long continued” in a 1941 issue.Coming from an old “Knickerbocker family”—or, the descendants of the wealthy Dutch class that settled New York—Caroline Schermerhorn married William Backhouse Astor, whose grandfather had amassed a fortune through fur trading and real estate.
Her husband's extreme wealth, combined with her social pedigree allowed her to reach, and remain, at the top of the upper echelon.And Mrs.
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