Mothers & Daughters

Able wives of able men help them, while they are on the rise, to save money. When their men have become tycoons or neartycoons, able wives become helpful as spenders. So do able daughters. Sons can be helpful, too, but their spendings are not likely to be so helpful to their fathers.

Except for really enormous sums for charity and endowments, men can spend publicly much less gracefully than women. Yet fairly large public spending is good for and gratifying to a wealthy man if his women do it well for him.

If it were entirely a man's world there would be no debutante parties, no newspaper stories of how much Banker So-&-So's daughter's party cost, how many orchids and cases of champagne there were. The Christmas holidays, when dancing youths are home from school & college, is the most propitious time for mothers & daughters to perform their parts in Society. Among the more spectacular parties which the women of the nation's affluent conceived, arranged and executed last week were the following: Washington's party-of-the-week, gauged by size and publicity, was not given for a Washingtonian. It was given by Mr. & Mrs. Henry Latham Doherty (utilities) of Manhattan* for Miss Helen Lee Eames Doherty, Mrs. Doherty's daughter by her first marriage. For the past few months they have stopped at the Mayflower Hotel, in the ballroom of which the debut was held. Decorations: plants, smilax, poinsettias. Along one side of the room stretched a double tier of boxes where sat Vice President Curtis and Mrs. Edward Everett Gann, Secretary of War & Mrs. Patrick Hurley, Papal Marquis George MacDonald. Also present: The Ministers of Switzerland.

Panama, Albania, Norway, Bolivia, Irish Free State, Nicaragua, Ecuador, South Africa. A special train brought New Yorkers to the affair. Tall Miss Doherty--who speaks seven languages--wore a number of bouquets, tossed them bridewise to friends. Favors were drawn from a miniature cathedral in the centre of the supper table. Music was furnished by Sidney's Orchestra, the band selected to play at last year's White House holiday party. Estimated cost of the Doherty debut:

$250,000.* Next day Senator George William Norris took the opportunity to sermonize on the unequal distribution of wealth. Said he: "I read with great interest about the Doherty ball given here while across the street they were feeding the hungry. I don't see how they had the heart to do it." Allan Hoover's favorite orchestra was at the Doherty party, but he went that night to a smaller affair (250 guests) given by Governor of the Federal Reserve Board & Mrs. Eugene Meyer Jr. for their daughter Elizabeth. It was a post-debut celebration (Debutante Meyer came out the week before). Swankiest elements of the guest list: children of the French and Belgian Ambassadors; the daughters of the Governor of Porto Rico, of the Governor General of the Philippines and of the Secretary of Agriculture; the son of the Secretary of the Navy. Manhattan. Surrounded by liveried negroes, Mr. & Mrs. William Robertson Coe introduced Natalie Mai Coe to society in a setting designed to remind guests that one branch of the family had pre-Civil War Charleston, S. C., connections. The Crystal Room of the Ritz-Carlton was decked out to represent a southern garden, with a Colonial portico at one end. Additional southern atmosphere was furnished by the food (fried chicken, beaten biscuit) and entertainment (Tapdancer Bill Robinson). Guests numbered 300. Most spectacular Manhattan function was given, also in the Crystal Room, by Mr. & Mrs. Franklyn L. Hutton for their daughter Barbara. Setting, designed by Joseph Urban: a moonlit garden, with eucalyptus sprays, silver birches, potted roses, a gauze canopy speckled with stars. Guests: 1,000. Cost: $100,000. Item: 2,000 cases of champagne. To an account of the Hutton ball the New York Times gave two columns. A two inch paragraph on the same page reported the debut, the same evening, of Florence, daughter of potent, conservative Banker & Mrs. George Fisher Baker Jr. Setting: the Baker home. Guest list: small. Chicago's outstanding debutante balls-of-the-week were two: Mr. & Mrs. Andrew Watson Armour (meats) and Mr. & Mrs. Walter Radcliffe Kirk (he recently sold his soap company to Procter & Gamble) gave a joint, lavish party at the Blackstone for their daughters Elsa Armour and Beatrice Kirk; Mr. & Mrs. Gustavus Franklin Swift (meats) and Mr. & Mrs.

Huntington Badger Henry (she was a Swift) gave a joint, lavish party at the Blackstone for their daughters Geraldine Swift and Hortense Henry. San Francisco. Mrs. Adolph B.

Spreckels (sugar) chose wrought-iron Christmas trees and modernistic reindeer as the atmosphere for her daughter Dorothy's debut. Guests: 500.

* But on Washington's K Street, Mr. Doherty as a modest house, known as the Doherty Club at which many a famed guest is entertained from midnight on after Gridiron Club dinners.

* Par for a New York debut is $11,500 (FORTUNE, December).

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.