Northern Wisconsin advertiser. [volume] (Wabeno, Wis.) 1898-1925, 1902-03-27
GETTING INTO NEW YORK CLUBS.
Routine Followed by Most of the City
Clubs.


Clubs.
Membership in half a dozen New
York clubs by no means presupposes
access to a particular social set. IL is
perfectly well known that few CLUBS
are mainly recruited from the RASH
ionable world but for the most part
clubs do not insist that candidates
for membership bear certain social
hallmark. There are clubs that de-
mand of members a college diploma,
and others that insist that candidates
have an American ancestry OF some.
generations. There are still others
that without openly insisting upon
any of these things shut their doors
against any but persons possessing
certain social requisites not easily at
: tanned
Most clubs, however, ask only that
a candidate for membership come
properly accredited. In many clubs
the investigation of candidates is left
! to an admissions committee. This
committee reports monthly upon the
candidates that have been posted in
| the clubhouse the necessary number
of days, and if the report OF The com
mittee is favorable the board of tIus-
tees usually elects. In few clubs
election is by vote of all such mem
| bers as choose to attend the monthly
| meetings or to send proxies.
Clubs that are careful as to electing
members require that candidate be
vouched for not only by proposer and
| seconder, but also by two or more
other members. The full name the
business address, the residence, the
occupation are demanded by the body
| charged with the task of looking up
the records of candidates.
| In some clubs a single objection is
| enough to exclude a candidate. The
! traditional black ball has disappeared
from the elections of many clubs, and
some have no hard and fast rule as to
the number of objections that shall
exclude candidate. Some years ago
| there was a long and lively contest
over the name of an entirely reputa-
| bic man proposed for a club now de-
funct. The candidate had a single
influential enemy in the club and that
one mans influence was enough to
! keep him out
| 1t requires from a month to six
weeks to get an unobjectionable can
didate elected to club. A candidate
would not ordinarily accept the hos
| pitalities of a club pending his can
didacy, and there are a good many
didate had been the guest of a mem
Der while his name was yet under
clubs in which the fact that a can
consideration would go far toward ex-
Guiding the candidate.
1t is said now and then that this or
that club has long waiting list. In
some clubs this merely means that
undesirable candidates are to be dis
| couraged by the prospect OF a long
delay in election. The waiting list
! has convenient way of melting be-
fore the application of just the right
sort of man. One method of getting
rid of the waitirg list is arbitrarily to
extend the limit of membership. a
thing that is not infrequently done
when the club finds it hard to make
both ends meet.
1t is found now and then that a Few
men in club have set themselves to
keep out certain classes of applicants
| whom they think Objectionable. The
method of attack with these men Is to
watch the posted list of candidates
and wire letters of objection against
the candidates whom they seek to
| exclude. Some men are thus kept out,
and the election of others is delayed
| but the systematic character OF the
attack at length defeats its own end.
A man once in club is hard to get
out. He must commit some overt act
to incur expulsion. When an opiec-
! tionable man is careful not to violate
club rules and always to pay his dues
and his house account promptly it is
| almost impossible to get rid of him.
One club was years in ousting a mem
Der whose habitual slovenliness of
| dress was source of offense to all
his fellow members. Nobody quite
| liked to make formal objection to him
on that score. and so he haunted the
clubhouse for years in clothing that
would have excluded him from any
good hotel, although it was well
known that he was amply able to
| dress decently. At length. through
some oversight, he left a club bill un-
| paid beyond the time allowed for nav.
ment, and his name was dropped from
the club list. Only a week before.
however, he appeared in a new suit
of c'othes.--New York Sun.