How We Got Here, Part 1

I think that before further delving into the current culture of Young Hollywood, I should step back to take a look at the history of celebrity in America and how it has evolved over time.


From the reading I've done, I've come to the conclusion that idolization and celebrity are deeply intertwined in American culture. After the American Revolution, citizens idolized military and literary heros (George Washington), as well as statesmen (Thomas Jefferson), to give the country a sense of historical legitimacy. The traditional social institutions personified and idolized are the building blogs of a democratic nation - the nation that the Founding Fathers and colonists hoped to produce after the Revolution.
Between 1820 and 1860, Americans began to look toward a new, abstract set of ideals in a hero. Known as the "American Adam," this new idol was a figure of innocence and promise for the new nation. Americans were optimistic about the emerging culture of their new nation - the emerging novelists, essayists, poets, critics, historians, and preachers all epitomized self-reliance, virtue, and industry - values that everyday people admired. Abraham Lincoln can be seen as the figurehead of the "American Adam" hero - Ralph Waldo Emerson referred to him as "a man of the people [with a] strong sense of duty" in 1865. This was not an alien notion to the country - the Founding Fathers, as well as first presidents of America upheld similar values.
However, in the late 19th century, the communications revolution and newly-created large urban city-scapes changed the face of fame itself. The graphic revolution allowed magazines and newspapers to mass-produce and be distributed to all areas of the country. With the high speed press, linotype, and halftone photo reproduction came news organizations such as the Associated Press. Daily newspapers became the average citizen's supplier of local & world news. During this time (1867-1890), increasing literacy rates and increasing leisure time caused the circulation of the daily paper to increase by about 400%.
In addition, magazines such as McClures began publication in the 1890's. These publications engaged its readers imaginations to re-define ideas of fame, success, and national heroism. Idols became hero-inventors such as Thomas Edison and Henry Ford; as well as commercial entrepreneurs such as John D. Rockefeller and J.P. Morgan. All of these men rose to the top of their respective fields through Social Darwinism (survival of the fittest), which many citizens believed was the cause of the success of some and failure of many.
The mass migration of Eastern and Southern Europeans at the close of the 19th century created urbanized cities, middle classes, and dissolved the "genteel tradition" - the refined, almost aristocratic air - of the century past. This urbanization created a vernacular culture that became rooted in the entertainment industry. Entertainment was available for people of all social classes (from Vaudeville shows to Broadway productions), and thus all types of people demanded information on celebrities in newspapers and magazines. The rise of celebrity culture, however, is largely attributed to the switch from a production to a consumption society. Farming was no longer the family's means of survival. Instead, people commuted to the newly developed cities for work.
This caused a switch in cultural perspectives in the upper and upper middle classes - they felt threatened by the immigrants swarming into their cities and towns, taking their jobs, etc. The upper classes then began to tilt inward - away from selfless virtue and towards self-realization (away from character and towards personality). Personality consequently became a way to distinguish the self from the masses, and celebrity (how much attention your personality could get you) became the measure of success.

So, the urbanization of America and the communications revolution is what set the stage for the Hollywood culture. In my next entry, I plan to discover how the celebrities became, well, celebrities: adored by the masses, followed by photographers, written about by journalists, and never left alone.



Information found at:
Henderson, Amy
1992 Media and the Rise of Celebrity Culture. Organization of American Historians Magazine of History 6 (4).