Aesthetic Society of Jersey City.

The Aesthetic Society of Jersey City was founded in 1876 by the ethnologist and geologist Erminnie Adelle (Platt) Smith (1836-1886). The purpose of the Society was the promotion of the "cultivation and education of a taste for the beautiful in literature, science, and art." J. Owen Grundy writes that the Aesthetic Society was "perhaps the first woman's club in these parts to be devoted to educational rather than purely social or charitable pursuits" ('When Oscar Wilde and Matthew Arnold Came to Talk in Hudson County', Jersey Journal, 3 December 1969). The Society's cultural activities in arts and letters included music, poetry, theatrical productions, and recitations. After six years, the Society published Echoes of the Aesthetic Society of Jersey City. It is a compilation of songs, papers, essays and poems presented at its meetings.

Wilde spoke at one of the Society's meetings in June 1882, so the signing of this book predates his attendance at the meeting. Wilde’s signature is directly above that of the American poet Joaquin Miller, whose poem Como is included in Echoes. Wilde dined with Miller in New York on 5 February and had lectured at the Brooklyn Academy of Music two days earlier. It seems probable that Wilde's signature, and quite possibly the promise to come and speak to the society, was secured on one of these two occasions. Z.K. Pangborn, the editor of The Evening Journal, was reported to have been somewhat amazed at Erminnie Smith's invitation to the "notorious" poet.