Reporter and farmer. [volume] (Webster, Day County, Dakota [S.D.]) 188?-1946, 1895-07-04
MRS. JACK GARDNER.

V'Nc'~SC SNrCho ANU blZARRE Do
lNGS OF A BOSTON SOCIETY WOMAN.
She Has Diplomacy. Daring. Tact, Talent,
Proportions-A Lion Hunter-some of
Her d Conceits.
Boston has a remarkable woman, and
her name is Mrs. Jack Gardner; n wo-
man who does the things that are called
outre and bizarre, who scorns owen
tionality, who is rs prolific in pictUr,
esque caprices as she is indulgeut in ev.
cry odd within and vagary, 3 wg!3In
with the temperament of II bolleuliaE,
the finesse and tact of u Diplomat and
the daring which rides shod over
rigid social proprieties, " ach charms
tho stiff necked exponents o. tine Puri
tan civilization by the frank originality
of its innovations; a woman who is not
beautiful, yet fascinating; not cultured
Tin the Boston sense), yet a most invet-
crate patron of aesthetics; who is not
highborn, yet the queen regent of the
Hubs most exclusive and blue blooded
society.
She is rich. She is married. She has
no children. She is not young. For 20
years and more she hes kept Boston So
ciety talking about her. In the Huh her
eccentricities are well known. They are
expected. In New York she is only half
known or not known at all, although
she was born there. In New York there
is no woman like her.
Some Of the more nmarkable facts
which have made Mrs. Jack Gardner's
career unique and her name a synonym
for q social sensation are these:
She is the first and only social leader
in Boston to encourage and entertain at
her home the bohemian set of artists,
litterateurs, musicians and theatrical
people.
She is the patroness of Boston's most
ritualistio Episcopacy, the Church of the
Advent, and during Lent attends early
mass, and it is an uncontradicted tradi-
ton that on u day OF penance a few
years ago she donned the modern sack
cloth and ashes Of an old gown and ON
her knees scrubbed the floor Of the
church.
She is the only societS woman ever
known or reported % have gone into the
retirement of a convent during a period
of religious humiliation after a gay sea-
son of social dissipation.
She was the first woman to make a
personal examination of Sandow's mus
cles.
She paid Paderewski 81, 900 for a pri-
vate concert at Bumstead hall, in Bos-
ton, at which the music teachers and
music students of the Hub were her
guests.
She has hired the Boston Symphony
orchestra at fabulous rates to play at her
house for her private entertainment.
She chartered a special train and rode
in the engine cab from Boston to Bever-
ly one day on a wild chase to overtake a
coaching party which she was unable to
join at the start.
She hired C~armencita, the Spanish
dancer, when in the zenith Of her glory,
to dance before a select party of Boston
society people.
She pre-empted one evening the Chi
nese theater on Harrison avenue, the
Mott street of Boston, and hired the Ce-
iestiai actors TO give q special perform
ance for her friends and herself.
She was the first society ~patroness of
Sargent, the artist, to whom she paid
So, 900 for painting her portrait, and thus
gave the impulse to his popularity as a
painter Of society women's portraits.
AT the artists festival several years
ago she was attended by a diminutive
negro page holding up her train. Rumor
had it that she would lead a tame Loop
ard or tiger. Her queer conceit was the
talk Of society for weeks thereafter.
She is the only woman in New Eng
land who raises her own ~violets, and
she is seldom seen in public without a
great bunch Of the purple beauties.
She stood at the door and distributed
programmes at a recital given by her
protege, Clayton Johns, the musician.
She is said to be the heroine of Marion
Crawford's famous novel ITO Lee
ward" Of Hamilton Aides Voyage OF
Discovery" of MRS. Harry st. john
and Philip st. Glare" novels Of Bos-
ton society life by Count Znbof.
one is the OILY proHllneuI sociSty W.
man who has ever attended g theatrical
performance by Champion Corbett. This
she did in Boston and sat in a box.
She captured M. Paul Bourget, the
French novelist, summer before last as
soon as he left Newport and entertained
him at her simmer residence at Beverly
| Farms for several weeks.
She gave a musicale one evening and
invited the De Reszke brothers, who
were then singing in grand opera in
Boston. No other society woman had
succeeded in overcoming their determi-
nation not to sing at a social function,
but Mrs. Jack Gardner did t