[2] He was not born into an upper-class family, but attended the elite Hotchkiss School, of which he later recalled "there were no blacks, maybe one Chinese person, who was the son of a missionary, and a quota on Jews.

"[1] He received a Bachelor of Arts degree in English from Williams College in 1950, and then worked as an advertising copywriter for Needham Harper Steers (now DDB Worldwide) in New York City.

Among his clients was the popular magazine Ladies' Home Journal, for which Birmingham was credited with coining the slogan "Never underestimate the power of a woman.

[3] Birmingham had a great interest in the upper classes, and wrote numerous books about the wealthy in the United States, generally focusing on their ethnicity, national origins, and geographic locale.

Our Crowd was on The New York Times Bestseller List for 47 weeks; its notoriety led to people often mistakenly assuming Birmingham was Jewish himself.