Before magazines were common and well before the internet was even a fictional fantasy, letters were the form of communication.  We’d often like these to discuss the ‘great’ events of the day, those important to history.  The people writing them, however, were as human as we….  Fashion, weather, jobs, conversations, chance meetings, the little important events of lives.

Here Julie writing to her mother in 1845 gives her some information on NYC fashions:

“Dresses stand out as much as ever, stiff skirts are worn and very full indeed. Don’t have your silk made, wait till next year and then come down to New York, and we will go together to Connecticut.* Tight sleeves seem to be the reigning mode with all sorts of caps set into the armhole. Black straw hats are a good deal, trimmed with velvet scarves, mostly crimson. All sorts of fanciful head dresses, made of ribbon, lace, feathers, flowers, and everything else put in all imaginable forms. Hair is worn low and high and between. I have seen all this at the concerts and so on where I have been.”

*Hartford, Ct actually was a fairly important town at the time.  They could probably get clothes cut there in fashions close to that of NYC, but more reasonably priced.