Time Magazine featured Perle Mesta on the cover on March 14, 1949.
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A self-described “feminist,” in a 1952 speech to the Democratic Convention, Mesta said, “Together, men and women are a tremendous force. And I feel certain that when our forefathers said that our society should be based on equal rights for all men, they did not mean it just that way. They meant equal rights for all men—and women.”
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Serving as the inspiration for Irving Berlin’s Broadway musical comedy “Call Me Madam” starring Ethel Merman, diplomat and political activist Perle Reid Skirvin Mesta became affectionately known as The Hostess with the Mostes’.
Born in 1889 in Sturgis, Michigan, Mesta was the oldest child of William (Bill) Balser Skirvin and Harriet Elizabeth Reid. While her childhood was spent in Galveston, Texas, the family moved to Oklahoma City in the early 1900s. Her father, Bill Skirvin, struck it rich in the oil business and also had found success in real estate. In 1910, he broke ground on Oklahoma City’s Skirvin Hotel, located at First and Broadway Streets. By the time it was finished, the hotel was the biggest in Oklahoma and the most luxurious in a multi-state area.
The Skirvin family moved into the hotel, residing on the ninth floor in a suite. Mesta and her older siblings were educated at private boarding schools. In 1915, after attending the Sherwood School of Music, Mesta moved to New York City where she lived with her great aunt on Park Avenue.
It was there that she met George Mesta, owner of the Mesta Machine Company, a manufacturer of steel machinery based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Although George Mesta was several years her senior, the two fell in love and married in 1917.
During the World War I years, the newlyweds spend much of their time in Washington, D.C., where George Mesta served on a labor management committee under the American Federation of Labor. He also turned over the use of his plant to help manufacture war machinery.
When they returned to Pittsburgh, Mesta became interested in the welfare of the workers at the plant. She began making contact with the employees, first by having them and their families to her home for Christmas. Next, she suggested an onsite cafeteria and a hospital for the workers. Then, she noticed that many of the young apprentices at the plant had not finished their high school degrees. Mesta’s observations resulted in the apprentices being granted two hours per day of studies with pay. Another employee benefit that Mesta fostered was the organization of a nursery to care for the children of the plant’s workers.
Mesta also began an active schedule as a volunteer, working for the welfare of children. She and her husband also traveled in Europe. But after eight years of marriage, her life took a dramatic turn. George Mesta died suddenly and unexpectedly of a heart attack in April of 1925.
Mesta found herself as the majority stockholder in the Mesta Machine Company. Her father encouraged her to become involved actively in the business, running it just as her husband had done. There were eight men on the board of directors—Mesta assumed the ninth slot. However, she named her husband’s brother as president, and although she remained on the board of directors, she opted not to run the company. Bereaved, she left Pittsburgh and moved to Washington, D.C.
For a few years, Mesta spent an uncertain period in which she described herself as spending too much money and gambling away even more. Finally, she settled down emotionally and in the late 1920s, began hosting the parties for which she would become so famous. These first parties were held both in Washington, D.C. and in New York City, with summer parties occurring in Newport, Rhode Island.
Mesta continued to make many visits back to Oklahoma. In 1930, she went in with her father on a joint oil venture in the Oklahoma City Field. The Skirvin-Mesta team struck oil, and with the profits the two decided to invest in an addition to the Skirvin Hotel called the Skirvin Tower. The ballroom in the Tower was the largest in Oklahoma, with a capacity of 2,500 people.
In the mid-1930s, Mesta again teamed up with her father on an oil venture east of Oklahoma City. One well turned out to be gas, and it was too far from a pipeline to harvest. However, the duo hit other oil wells and continued to prosper.
Mesta became concerned when she discovered her father was investing some of her oil profits without her approval. Disagreements began that terminated in litigation, a move she later regretted as it drug on for several years. But, the family remained on friendly terms, and ultimately a court-appointed hotel manager stepped in to oversee the two Skirvins.
Around this same time, Mesta became interested in the National Woman’s Party, an organization dedicated to the equal rights for women campaign. It was at this point that Mesta became a self-described “feminist.” She began to direct her energy toward a constitutional amendment giving women equal rights. Mesta also joined the World Woman’s Party, taking her involvement to an international level.
By 1944, Mesta, always a staunch Republican, became disillusioned with her party and changed her political affiliation. She registered as a Democrat, and became interested in some of the social welfare programs of the day. That same year, she was named an alternate delegate to the Democratic Convention. She worked tirelessly for the adoption of the Equal Rights Amendment into her party’s platform. Sadly, also in 1944, Bill Skirvin was injured in an auto accident, and died shortly thereafter at the age of 84.
When Harry Truman became president, Perle Mesta dined at the White House for the second time in her life. (The first time was with her husband, who was a big financial supporter of Calvin Coolidge.) She leased a home in Washington, D.C., formerly occupied by Herbert Hoover, with the specific goal of using the home for lavish entertaining. By this point in her life, Mesta had come to realize the influence a party could have on politics when important groups of people were brought together in a social situation. Her guest lists were strategically planned to accommodate the topics of the day.
Mesta continued a very close association with Harry Truman and his family. In 1948, she was named assistant to the finance chairman of the Democratic National Committee, a fundraising position. She also became a delegate to the convention, representing Rhode Island. She was further honored by being asked to help with the Inaugural Ball when Truman was re-elected to office.
Her biggest honor, however, came in 1949 when Truman named her the Minister to Luxembourg. The appointment of Mesta to a diplomatic position was designed to raise the standing of women in politics, and it was not without controversy. Many criticized the appointment as being a political favor based solely on campaign contributions.
Mesta decided to shake off the criticism, although she was often ridiculed in the press. She moved to Luxembourg and assumed her position with all seriousness and with a profound sense of responsibility. One of her accomplishments was the establishment of monthly G.I. parties to entertain the U.S. troops stationed nearby. By 1953, Mesta had entertained a total of 25,000 men and women in the service, all paid for by her personally. She was also proud to have assisted in the organization of the European Coal and Steel Community, a joint economic venture involving Germany, Belgium, France, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. In 1953, Mesta was fired from her position primarily because of a change in administration and party leadership in the United States. The people of Luxembourg gave her a warm and emotional send-off.
In the last twenty years of her life, Mesta never gave up the goal of a constitutional amendment granting equal rights to women. In a speech given at the Democratic Convention in 1952, Mesta said, “Together, men and women are a tremendous force. And I feel certain that when our forefathers said that our society should be based on equal rights for all men, they did not mean it just that way. They meant equal rights for all men—and women.”
Mesta returned to Oklahoma City in 1974. She died there a year later. She was laid to rest alongside her husband in the George Mesta Mausoleum in Homewood Cemetery in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.