Retail Capitalists and the Politics of Mobility in the Modern Consumer City

With the expansion of the consumer economy at the turn of the twentieth century, an unprecedented number of unescorted women streamed into the central business districts of America’s largest cities. This daily crush created new opportunities for sexually aggressive men, known as “mashers,” to ogle and insult respectable ladies on the street. In Chicago, female shoppers protested that street harassment hindered their ability to circulate freely in the retail district and rendered blocks where mashers congregated inaccessible to respectable women. Their claims troubled the city’s major retailers, whose financial success largely depended on the ability of female customers to linger and spend money downtown. To eliminate restraints on shoppers’ mobility, these retail capitalists resolved to purge the city center of “vicious” characters. Mashers were not their only targets, however. The retailers also sought to drive out prostitutes who frequented downtown saloons and, it was said, promoted inappropriate expressions of male desire. Thus, in facilitating the flow of reputable ladies in the city center, Chicago retailers attempted to constrain the movement of disreputable women. To achieve this feat, they collaborated with clubwomen, city officials, and police to eradicate street harassment and prostitution in the central business district. This retailer-led effort, my paper argues, provided affluent women with unprecedented mobility in the city center. It also expanded the role of the state, as well as activist women, in creating and maintaining the moral and physical environment that enabled the rise of American consumer capitalism.