The proper conduct of a housewife in 1950....

I stayed home with my children for seven years full-time and part-time another five years.
I never felt brainwashed - I felt privileged to be able to be home with the kids and be the one to care for them and see them grow on a day to day basis- and I'm speaking as someone who loved the job I would have had outside the home.

Most women I know expressed either their gratitude that they were in a position to stay home with their children or their envy of those who were in that position because they weren't.
There were a few who had children and promptly and happily went back to work forty hours a week with no backward glances or regrets about what they were missing at home.

But there wasn't this attitude about coddling the husband so much. For me it was more 'fair's fair' = he's out busting his butt to pay the bills - I can keep the house clean and make a home while I get to have fun playing with the kids.

I still think the foot massage thing was written by a man- or a woman who tried to give a man who didn't like foot massages a foot massage.

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@Setanta,

Setanta wrote:

All American schools in the 1950s and well into the 1960s had "home economics" courses which were to teach the girls to cook and sew and keep house.

I though they learned that from their mothers. Werent their mothers supposed to be home the whole day, after all? =)

Setanta wrote:

At the end of our senior year, we snuck into the chem lab, and took a bottle of white phosphorus sticks, which ignite in water (i forget what they were stored in, but a liquid in which they would not ignite. We poured the contents of the jar down one of the lab table drains, turned on the water and got the hell out of there.

The home ec room was in the basement immeidately below. Apparently some of the Junior girls were in there, baking for some kind of event. The white phosphorus burned through the pipes and landed on their stoves. No one was injured, but man, everybody was seriously pissed. The only thing i can say in mitigation is that we had no idea--that's how we learned just how volatile white phosophorus is.

I always wonder why people do stupid things like this...

well, why did you? =)

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Don't you remember being a teenager?

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I remember seeing a show on tv about all these career women who had chosen to focus on becoming something.
They had all worked their asses off, but then the time came when they wanted to start a family and have children. The only problem was that they weren't able to anymore. They had gotten too old and had no more eggs. And they were raising hell about their rights to have children. Saying things like "why didn't anyone tell us?".

Some just take it too far..

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@manored,

manored wrote:

Setanta wrote:

All American schools in the 1950s and well into the 1960s had "home economics" courses which were to teach the girls to cook and sew and keep house.

I though they learned that from their mothers. Werent their mothers supposed to be home the whole day, after all? =)

Normally kids went to school in those days so mama was home alone. And many moms did teach that stuff so I've never understood why they taught girls Home Ec. Better boys get taught that and girls get I.E. or mechanics or something. I also don't know why we had to take sewing. In Home Ec, we made tea and toast and canned pears - oh how useful!

Oh, and I was dared to eat the formalehyed eggs from a fish were dissecting and I did - kids are stupid.

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@Mame,

Quote:

And many moms did teach that stuff so I've never understood why they taught girls Home Ec.

I think it was because homemaking skills were considered critical to the success of these girls, and knowing that some girls had no mother who was around/willing/able to teach these things the education system had to pitch in, make sure that these things were learned.

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@hawkeye10,

Yeah, but if girls didn't have a mom, they were likely already doing that stuff. "Critical to the success of girls" - lol. That's quite funny.

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@Mame,

Quote:

Critical to the success of girls" - lol. That's quite funny

Please, you are an old enough a broad to know that I am correct, that is how people thought back then. Even well into the 60's girls were going to college for no other pupose than to land the right man, getting a man was everything. Knowing how to cook and sew was considered critical to getting a man to marry a girl, ie critical to her success.

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Yeah, damn it, Mame . . . you old broad . . .

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@Setanta,

****, I haven't heard "broad" in years. More old thinking, what?

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@Mame,

Quote:

****, I haven't heard "broad" in years. More old thinking, what?

said to convey to you that I remember those days, even though I was a lad at the time. You seem to suffer from revisionist history, or forgetting history, I am not sure which.

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@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

You seem to suffer from revisionist history, or forgetting history, I am not sure which.

Why would you say that?

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@Mame,

Quote:

Why would you say that?

because you labeled how things were back then as a joke when I pointed it out. My claim that we had home EC in schools so that girls could grow into successful women is not funny, it is how it was.

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Are you always so ponderous?

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Woohoo ! ! !

Now that's entertainment!

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@Mame,

Quote:

Are you always so ponderous?

No, but I am in a bad mood so I am today.....

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@hawkeye10,

In my mood
I brood
No money
No food

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@Cyracuz,

Quote:

No money
No food

Got that, but no fish....found out today that something has fished ALL of the goldfish and koi out of my pond.....

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@hawkeye10,

So it went from fish to something fishy?

Whoever steals goldfish?

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@Cyracuz,

Quote:

Whoever steals goldfish?

Cats I expect...don't see many coons around these parts. Maybe birds though..

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The proper conduct of a housewife in 1950....

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