High Style in the Gilded Age: Southampton 1870-1930

Helen Barney and her father, Charles, in costume for a themed dinner party at the family townhouse on Fifth Avenue in New York City, just one of the many residences Helen’s hard-working socialite mother, Lily, was expected to manage. Lily, a sister of the American political leader and financier William Collins Whitney, was constantly on the job in Southampton. The Barney house on Lake Agawam was one of the first to add a ballroom. The photo is part of the new exhibit “High Style in the Gilded Age: Southampton 1870-1930,” which opens at the Southampton History Museum’s Rogers Mansion Saturday, August 17, with a reception from 4 to 6 PM.