4. It was the wealthy who gilded the age through their extravagances
It was during the Gilded Age that the gap between the very rich and the rest of America was displayed with a prominence never before demonstrated in American society. The rich built huge mansions, often called cottages, at Newport, Rhode Island and Massachusetts’ Berkshire Hills. They resorted to spas in upstate New York and other desirable sites, getting away from the cities where they built their fortunes to spend them freely and lavishly. New York’s Fifth Avenue was lined with huge palatial residences built by the great names of American industry. The Vanderbilts, Rockefellers; the tobacco and cotton giants of the resurging south; the oil and coal barons, all created an American aristocracy which had not existed before the Civil War.
Ostentatious displays of wealth were not limited to summer homes. Those with the means built and raced yachts, traveled in richly appointed private rail cars, and rode the newly paved city streets in expensive carriages and motorcars. They dined in sumptuous surroundings in restaurants like New York’s Delmonico’s, which operated in multiple locations, where they could be seen with personages from politics, the theater, and the arts. Meals themselves were displays of conspicuous consumption, a series of courses served accompanied by a series of champagnes and other wines, followed by lavish desserts and aperitifs. The middle and working classes were far removed from the wealthy elite, and the distance between them grew throughout the Gilded Age.