The Gilded Age Characters Who Are Based on Real People

The Gilded Age, HBO’s period drama following from Downton Abbey’s Julian Fellowes, returns for a third season of rich people behaving badly on June 22.

The title refers to the real historical period in the late 19th century when industrialists amassed immense fortunes and dominated the most exclusive social circles in Manhattan and Newport, Rhode Island. In the show, much of the drama is fueled by a sort of cold war between the “old money” families and the “nouveau rich” families, who have newly made their money in the booming railroad industry.

The Gilded Age is fiction, but informed deeply by history, with several characters that are based on real people. From the socialites who ran the big parties of the day to the leaders representing key causes of the time, like women’s suffrage, here are The Gilded Age characters inspired by real historical figures.

Mrs. Astor

Played by: Donna Murphy

Known for: Social gatekeeping

Caroline Schermerhorn Astor was at the top of the Gilded Age social scene, representing a family that amassed its wealth through the fur trade and real estate. She was known for hosting lavish parties, attended by New York’s elite, and as The Gilded Age shows, she represented an “old money” set and looked down upon socialites like the Vanderbilts who represented “new money,” especially from the booming railroad business. Mrs. Astor split her time between a townhouse in Manhattan—where the Empire State Building currently stands—and a mansion in Newport called Beechwood.

Played by: Nathan Lane 

Known for: Hobnobbing

The social climber became famous for coining the term “the 400,” referring to the 400 most influential people in New York. He was one of the first of his Manhattan crowd to summer in Newport, Rhode Island, helping to make it a destination for some of the country’s richest families. As The Gilded Age shows, he fell out with many of the socialites when he started leaking stories about them to the press and published the 1890 tell-all Society as I Have Found It. 

Mamie Fish

Played by: Ashlie Atkinson

Known for: Themed parties 

The socialite was known for hosting outrageous themed parties at her Upper East Side townhouse, country estate in the Hudson River Valley, and her mansion in Newport. At one party, guests could only talk in “baby talk,” at each other while dressed up as dolls. At another, they fed peanuts to elephants that roamed her property.

Charlotte Drayton

Played by: Hannah Shealy

Known for: Scandal

As The Gilded Age shows, the daughter of Mrs. Astor became the talk of the town when it was revealed that she cheated on her husband James Coleman Drayton with their neighbor Hallett Alsop Borrowe. James challenged Hallett to a duel, but died of a heart attack before the duel could take place. In The Gilded Age, Charlotte’s socialite mother is afraid she won’t be able to appear at a ball with her daughter given all of the gossip.

JP Morgan

Played by: Bill Camp

Known for: Being a titan of industry

He built his reputation in railroad investments, the largest industry after the Civil War, focusing on mergers, reorganizing failing lines, and restructuring debt. According to the JPMorganChase website, when he sold William H. Vanderbilt’s shares of NY Central Railroad stock in 1879, that represented “the largest block of stock ever publicly offered at the time.” When he funds the completion of the Northern Pacific Railroad through the sale of $40 million in bonds, it represents “the largest transaction in railroad bonds ever made in the United States.”

Russell Risley Sage

Played by: Peter McRobbie

Known for: Being a railroad magnate

After representing the Whig party in Congress (1853-1857), he became one of the richest men in America from investing in the Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway and other railroads, often with fellow financier Jay Gould. He was also invested in Manhattan’s system of elevated railroads and what became the Western Union Telegraphic Company. In the last years of his life, he focused on moneylanding. In season 3 of the Gilded Age, he stands in the way of George Russell’s railroad scheme.

John Singer Sargent

Played by: Bobby Steggert

Known for: Portraits and impressionist paintings.

One of the most influential artists in the Gilded Age, he was greatly influenced by Claude Monet. The American’s most famous painting Madame X (circa 1884) caused a scandal at the time for depicting socialite Virginie Amélie Avegno Gautreau with a dress strap hanging down off her shoulder. He was forced to repaint the strap. In The Gilded Age, the Sargent character paints Gladys’ portrait.

Frances Ellen Watkins Harper

Mary H. Dickerson

Played by: Christina Clark

Known for: A dressmaking shop in Newport, R.I.

Dickerson was the first Black woman to own a shop on the bustling commercial strip of Bellevue Avenue. She owned a number of properties in Newport that are still standing and donated the proceeds to organizations that supported Black life in Newport. Through a Newport women’s league, she even helped establish a daycare center.

Frederick Kirkland

Played by: Brian Stokes Mitchell

Known for: Being one of the most influential leaders in Newport, R.I.

The character is based partially on Reverend Mahlon Van Horne, pastor of Newport’s Union Colored Congregational Church and the first Black member of Rhode Island’s General Assembly. In his 1887 sermon “The Negro in Rhode Island: His Past, Present and Future,” he spoke of the racial wealth gap and how important it is for Black people to own their homes and businesses so that they could pass on their wealth to the next generation.