The Ladies Who...

Running until february 17, 2013 is the wonderful exhibition LUNCH HOUR at the New York Public Library

A history of midday eating in New York the history covers everything from the introduction of school lunches to the personality differences between apple sellers and pretzel vendors at the turn of the century to the Algonquin Round Table whose famous participants were often so broke that they nursed a cup of tea all afternoon and stuffed themselves with the complimentary celery sticks and popovers until management caught on and stopped providing them.

There are menus and recipes a-plenty from exclusive restaurants to the Automat. I'm delighted to discover I've been using Horn & Hardart's baked bean recipe for years and I made it up!

I felt a glow of pride at the tribute to Sardi's

There is a film loop of movies with scenes in the automat from Joan Crawford in SADIE MCKEE to Marlo Thomas in THAT GIRL

and a replica of the automat although sadly without food. I saw the exhibition on an empty stomach and was ravenous after twenty minutes.

There were books teaching food history and the myriad uses of Jello

 

The most shocking news to me was that lunch at the Plaza was men only until 1969. Betty Friedan organised the National Organisation of Women (NOW) to march in protest outside the hotel wearing their mink coats (to indicate their respectability) and Betty wearing sunglasses to conceal the black eye her husband gave her that morning to prevent her attending. A group then entered the Oak Room where they sat and waited to be served. They were ignored until finally the waiters physically removed the table and left the women sitting in a circle. The women left quietly having lost the battle but within months the Plaza changed their policy without fanfare. And Friedan got a divorce.

So much fascinating material and I'm going back for a second viewing because there was too much to take in.
By the way, I saw Petula Clark wafting around the grocery stores again yesterday wearing exactly the same clothes. I think she might be a ghost.