The Bellevue House, Which Opened in 1828, Was One of Newport's First

The Bellevue House, which opened in 1828, was one of Newport’s first grand hotels, providing an unprecedented level of hospitality, comfort, and luxury in the City-by-the-Sea. Image from John Ross Dix. A Hand-Book of Newport, and Rhode Island (Newport, R.I.: C.E. Hammett, Jr, 1852), 157. NEWPORT HISTORICAL SOCIETY. Music and Dancing at the “Queen of Resorts”: The Impact of the Germania Musical Society on Newport’s Hotel Period Brian M. Knoth We have the most absolute faith in steam factories, but we do not wish to see any more built in Newport…Let not the hum of spindles mock the music of the Sea .1 Music and dancing were integral features of Newport’s revival as a popular resort destination during its hotel period that began in the 1840s . Following a long period of economic depression, this era marked Newport’s emergence as a premier watering hole, with the establishment of several large well-appointed seaside hotels . At its height, in the 1850s, Newport was a world-class summer destination, known as the “Queen of Resorts ”. An extraordinary group of German musicians called the Germania Musical Society were instrumental to Newport’s flourishing resort economy during the 1850s . The significance of the Germania on Newport’s summer society, music culture, and resort traditions during the 1850s cannot be overstated . The Germania Musical Society first played in Newport in 1849, and for much of the next decade brought unrivaled musical experiences to Newport summer audiences for the first time, complementing a stunning natural environment and luxurious accommodations . As the number of summer visitors in Newport ascended to unprecedented heights in the 1850s, the Germania became an indispensable part of the hotel culture, and as important to Newport’s first-rate reputation as any other attraction in the town . Although several scholars have produced studies of the Germania Musical Society, none have specifically focused on their impact on Newport hotel culture in the middle of the nineteenth century . H . Earle Johnson’s work on the group represents the first twentieth-century effort to bring the Germania to the attention of students of American musical history . In his seminal 1953 article, Johnson used Germania member Henry Albrecht’s memoir Skizzen aus dem Leben der Musik-Gesellschaft Germania, and extensive newspaper and periodical research as his primary sources 2. In 2010, scholar Nancy Newman published the most comprehensive work on the Germania Musical Society to date, Good Music for a Free People: The Germania Musical Society in Nineteenth-Century America.3 Newman’s book reflects exhaustive research on every Music and Dancing at the “Queen of Resorts” v 1 aspect of the Germania Musical Society, including its founding, its influential members, and its many successes in North America . Dr . Newman has observed that the history of the Germania, including its decade of performance in the heyday of Newport’s hotel period, is “rapidly disappearing from the textbooks .”4 Expanding on the work of previous authors, this article documents the critical importance of the Germania Musical Society to Newport’s ascendance as a premier resort in the mid-nineteenth century . By the 1840s the United States was undergoing major changes as birth rates rose and immigration increased . Cities on the Eastern seaboard were growing and an industrial economy drew men and women to more stable employment opportunities . Although upper class folks considered vacations commonplace, for pleasure or personal enrichment, that concept began to permeate a growing middle class by the mid-1800s, giving rise to a new phenomenon known as the “resort .”5 For an economically depressed Newport, the timing was ideal . Newport historian Lloyd Robson observed that, “The Long Embargo and the War of 1812 had finished Newport’s commerce and for the next twenty years she fumbled for a means of existence ”. 6 In addition, Newport’s attempts at manufacturing were thwarted by a lack of water power, and New Bedford monopolized the whaling industry . Newport needed an economic reawakening .7 Although Southerners had been drawn to Newport’s salubrious summer climate since the eighteenth century, arriving by various types of sailing vessels, the development of the steamship in the early 1800s would be a key factor in Newport’s revival and expansion as a premier summer resort destination for the entire East Coast . Commencing the new age in 1817, the Firefly provided direct service between Providence and Newport . Then in 1822, the Connecticut, offered service from New York to Providence via Newport in thirty hours .8 The opening of the Fall River Line in 1847 provided daily service from New York to Fall River via Newport in grand style . It provided an elegant and direct overnight travel experience for a relatively affordable price of one dollar without lodging, or three-dollars with a stateroom . Passengers could leave New York City in the evening, order a drink, relax, eat a fine meal (for fifty cents), enjoy a restful sleep, and wake up in Newport, all within ten hours 9. Along with the southern planters and businessmen who had been visiting Newport for several decades, “heat-beset hordes” arriving via steamboat from the Mid-Atlantic region provided an antidote to Newport’s economic ailments 10. The first real resort hotel in Newport, the Bellevue House on Catherine Street, opened for business in 1828 . Southerners who visited previously stayed in private homes or boarding houses where they could rent for the season . However, with a rising number of seasonal visitors, Newport became unable to accommodate the new influx of summer guests . Hotels like the Bellevue were built to meet the increased demand while also equipping Newport with improved accommodations that featured an enhanced level of hospitality, comfort, and class . The Bellevue House advertised the most luxurious rooms 2 v Newport History with the “best” beds and mattresses, all “entirely new,” a bar stocked with premium wines and liquors, and fine dining, all for a “reasonable” price .11 By 1835 Newport became so desirable as a destination that the hotels and boarding houses became overcrowded . The city was sorely in need of an even more spacious first- class establishment that could serve its growing clientele . The Ocean House hotel which opened on Bellevue Avenue and East Bowery Street in 1844 would fill that need while also definitively inaugurating the era of fashionable hotels in Newport . Immediately surpassing the grandeur of the Bellevue House and Newport’s other smaller hotels, the four-stories-high Greek Revival Ocean House featured unprecedented accommodations and services in Newport for upwards of three hundred affluent visitors . It was instantly successful, matching the most luxurious world-class hotels . The Ocean House offered vacationers topnotch accommodations, the finest dining, and an array of pleasures, including a two-story portico, beautiful ocean and harbor views, refreshing sea breezes, and the best entertainments around .12 Opened in 1844, the Ocean House hotel quickly became one of the most well-known and frequented establishments in Newport. It soon surpassed its rivals, offering the best lodgings and services in town. Stereograph, NEWPORT HISTORICAL SOCIETY COLLECTION, 2000.43.9. 2 v Newport History Music and Dancing at the “Queen of Resorts” v 3 Rivaling the splendor of the Ocean House and further indicating Newport’s rebirth and expansion as a summer destination, the Atlantic House hotel opened in 1845 on Bellevue Avenue and Pelham Street . It also featured Greek Revival design elements, including a glistening white veranda that wrapped around three of its sides . Standing four stories high, it could accommodate an additional two-hundred-fifty summer guests for Newport . Like the Ocean House, the Atlantic House was also known for its topnotch amusements, featuring dances and balls on a regular basis .13 A number of other hotels opened and thrived over the following two decades, but well-to-do summer visitors considered the Ocean House and Atlantic House (both eventually owned by brothers John and Joseph Weaver), the best in town 14. In 1854, Harper’s New Monthly Magazine affirmed the importance of both hotels in Newport’s economic revival: “From about the year 1840, and the erection of the ‘Ocean House’ and the ‘Atlantic House,’ may be dated the renaissance of Newport .”15 Even before the Germania Musical Society arrived in Newport, music and dancing were integral features of summer resort life . However, music itself was not yet a major focal point of the hotel experience . At that time, music took on a more functional role that was in service to the social experience of dancing . In fact, the musicians themselves were rarely (if ever) mentioned in newspaper articles that described dance events at the prominent hotels . A Newport Mercury article in August 1844 reported that a man identified as Gabriel de Korponay was in town (at a room in the Masonic Hall), “giving instruction in the principal fashionable dances prevailing in the highest circles of European Society,” including the polka, new forms of the quadrille…the new cotillions, the “masourka,” and others 16. A follow-up article mentioned that, “the greatest ball of the season was given at the Ocean House,” to honor de Korponay (“the teacher of the polka”) and, “it was a masked and fancy ball, and the Polka and Mazourka was danced in full costume ”. 17 As Jon Sterngass argues in his book, First Resorts: Pursuing Pleasure at Saratoga Springs, Newport, and Coney Island, resorts functioned as social playgrounds where social masking and experimentations with identity took place . Flirtation was often part of the act and the dance floor was often the setting for the action 18. Newport’s hops were notable, with hundreds of guests dancing until sunrise to the latest steps, including the most current and fashionable dance crazes such as the waltz, mazurka, redowa, and schottische .

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