Waterbury evening Democrat. [volume] (Waterbury, Conn.) 1887-1895, 1892-07-09
CLUB SERVANTS.
Thousands OF Them Employed In
New York City.
Social Organizations which Employ an
Army of People to Attend to Their
Various Wants-The Lead
ing Clubs.

If the servants and employees of any
one of the big clubs in this town were
marched in dress parade the array
would be decidedly imposing one, and
the size of the small army would sur
prise anybody who had not had occasion
to become familiar with the workings
of the larger New York clubs, says the
New York World. The Manhattan Attn
letic club probably heads the list of local
clubs-or American clubs, for that mat
term the number of people who wear
its livery, or at least draw money from
its treasury for attending to the wants
Of its members. More than two hum
dred men, women and boys are regular
~ employed in one capacity or another
in the big Manhattan Athletic club
house, and at times the attaches Of the
club house number as high as two hun
dred and fifty. This small army COM
prises door men, hall boys, walters, bar
tenders, attendants at the rifle range,
shooting gallery, baths and other de-
partments, elevator boys, bookkeepers,
accountants, engineers, flremen, cham
bermaids, cooks, washerwomen and
scrubwomen.
Humble though some of these en-
ployes are, it costs money to secure
their more or less professional services
for the club, and the salary list is be-
tween fifteen hundred dollars and two
thousand dollars week.
The Manhattan club, which probably
comes next in the length of its salary list,
employs between one hundred and forty
five and one hundred and fifty, and pays
them something over one thousand dol
lars week for, attending to the club
house and the wants of the men who
keep it a-going. The present Manhat-
tan Athletic club house is comparatively
a new thing, and naturally many, if not
most, of its attaches are comparatively
newcomers. But at the Manhattan
club, which is one of the old club insti-
buttons of the town, many of the help
have grown gray in the service. The
venerable female housekeeper, for in,
stance, has put in couple of decades
keeping things in order for the Man
hattanites, and dozen other employees
have been with the club for decade or
more. There is one detachment of the
Manhattan clubs employees whose very
existence is probably unknown to nine,
tenths of the clubs members. Every
mime gender, and every one is likewise
of the color of the ace of spades. The
women in question are the houseclean-
ers, and put in their appearance at the
clubhouse about sunrise, make things
lively for a couple of hours, and disap-
; pear before the earliest member of the
club has shaken off the embrace of Nor
pheus.
The Union league also has a big staff
of employees, as may be imagined from
the fact that it spends nearly ten thou
sand dollars every year in providing
them with livery. The New York Ath-
letic is another club which does o
| large business inthe way of employees;
likewise the Union club, the New York
club, the Lawyers club, and half doz-
en- other clubs on the same order. At
most of these clubs employees of a dozen
| or moro years standing may still be
| seen, and, in fact at any of the first
class clubs it is the rule to retain the
| doormen, so long as they behave them
| selves, in order to have at least a couple
of servants who are familiar with the
I faces of all the members. The Universe
| ty club, of course, has an immense
retinue of servants, but, as the rule
there seems to be to have a "shake-up"
once a month or SO, not more than half
dozen old-time attaches of the club are
| to be seen at the club house on Madison
avenue nowadays.
| At the really frst-class clubs an en-
deavor is made to secure as servants
only serving people who have had ex-
perience in private families or other
frst-class clubs, but at some of the
clubs almost everybody who responds
to the house committees advertise
ment is taken on faith and given a
chance to don the club livery. The
Lawyers club is a notable exception to
clubs of the last named order, the at
taches of that institution being particu-
larly we'll trained and disciplined. AL
most every one of them has seen service
in the better class of New York fami-
lies and every one of them thoroughly
understands his place. There is rarely
or never any complaint of incivility OF
lack of attention on the part of the
servants of the Lawyers club, and that
fact, perhaps, as much as anything
else, accounts for the extreme populari
ty Of the club. Altogether probably
eight thousand or ten thousand people
find employment in the clubs of this
city.