Women's roles in the Household: Popular Press Depictions of gender roles in the USA (1870-1960)

by Plamena Ivanova

Social constructions of womanhood and manhood, namely differences between men and women, has been a widely-discussed issue since time immemorial. At least once in our life we have witnessed stereotyping or experienced expectations that concern gender at their core. Women are perceived somehow always weaker than men, incapable of doing the same things and even sometimes having less brain potential. As time passes, however, women have shown that they are as capable as men. Although women prove themselves every single day, we can still see some scars of gender stereotyping in our society. We can still detect some old-times legacy about gender.

If we try to compare modern women with women in the thirties, we will see a big progress in woman’s emancipation. In almost any previously taboo for women sphere, we will see development. But will we see such great difference in women’s roles if we compare the 1870s and 1960s?

This small paper examines gender in the United States by focusing on women’s roles between 1870 and 1960. Sources for the analysis is the contemporary popular press and culture. These sources provide windows into society, give a glimpse on the social ideas, norms and "real" lives.

Nowadays, household tasks and home management concern everyone in a family; men are equally responsible with their female counterparts for the management of their house.

In the 19^th through mid 20^th century, household tasks were not equally distributed. All spheres in everyday life were strictly polarized. Men and women had tasks which were strictly determined by their sex. Women were, for example, primarily responsible for the home. To be the perfect housewife was top priority throughout the entire popular press and popular culture. To be a housewife was one of the few things which a woman could be, but this was also a thing considered of greatest importance for social prosperity. As one of the mottos of a Gilded Age magazine put it, “The housewife makes the home, and the home makes the nation.” [1]

Later in the 1930s advertisements didn’t show very different idea about women’s roles from that of the 1880s. Women were depicted in almost all of the cases surveyed in their homes doing happily some kind of chore. In the 1950, women’s magazines such as “Ladies Home Journal” and “Good Housekeeping” were still having a large circulation. They were very influential for building the image of the "modern" woman. This image was that of the housewife. From some articles published we can deduct that women’s role as housewife was still leading.

What made popular culture during that period different from pop culture in the 1880s was the stress on the idea that has to be not only a housewife but also the "perfect" one. All the tasks a housewife was supposed to do had to fit perfectly in time, to be well considered and brilliantly executed. The meals had to be served hot exactly when the man of the house came back from work, and he should not wait a minute longer. Products which had to be bought had to be deliberated on for hours, even the filling in of the salt and pepper shakers had to be done perfectly on time.[2]

Were women influenced by such articles and advertisements? Did they, in other words, strive for "perfectionism"? The “Good Housekeeping” magazine offered a question-box for its readers and the people there (mostly women) asked about everything they were interested in. A question-box in one of the issues of the magazine in 1944 makes us really believe that women were striving for perfection. The questions asked concerned housekeeping, cooking and serving in such a detailed way that women in the 40's seemed to be really obsessed with knowing in detail the household tasks they were doing. Questions asked in those question-boxes calories of certain foods, appropriate ways of serving certain vegetables, appropriate ways of preserving vitamins etc. [3]

The argument that women were perfectionists about their household routine by judging from the popular press can be unreliable. Women’s real manner of executing their tasks might have not been so perfection-oriented. Maybe the editors of the women’s magazines published only the questions concerning perfect catering at home in order to establish an example of how women should do their job. Maybe that’s how society wanted to see women; that was the widely-accepted idea.

"Perfect" housekeeping might not have been the entire truth about women’s roles, but housekeeping was for sure their greatest domain. The popular press introduced this fact as something which was totally enough and worth being proud of. All the virtues and prudence came from the home so housewives, as being guardians and caretaker of the home, were considered the ones who possessed those virtues and values and who had one of the most significant roles in society.

The popular press was uncompromising about the women who dared to deviate from this social norm – mere failures.

“Whenever a woman’s house shall be…her delight, she will not be a victim of ennui or vanity”. [4]

This statement made in an article in 1930 and it clearly showed people’s perceptions of the importance that a woman should be a housewife and the ruin she turns into if she doesn’t comply with that norm. In the mid 19^th century this situation was more or less the same – bad and incompetent housewives were made fun of and their image was ridiculed.

But if the household was the work of the 18^th and mid 19^th century woman, where was she spending her leisure time? What was she doing when she had no household chores to worry about? It is undisputable fact that women had free time during the period from 1870s to 1960s, especially with the advent of the new household appliances, and the popular culture and press talked about this leisure time.

The most striking about this period was that women’s free time was almost always within the house, if it by some chance wasn’t spend at home - leisure time was almost always connected either with taking care of children or being companion to husbands.

Chicago World’s Fair in 1893, for example, was a place from which you can easily get a clear idea about ongoing popular culture at that time. It was a place that showed the progress done in any human sphere. It was also a place in which gender roles and shared beliefs could be clearly detected because they were clearly framed.

Women, as inevitable part of society, were participants in this fair; they were visitors as well as organizers. They had their own building which represented their progress and development.

The Woman’s Building was dedicated to the woman and her work. The most interesting and important things about this building were the items displayed there, the activities with which women were occupying their time. “Indeed, much of the work displayed by female artists-needle work and furniture ornamented with images of natural fecundity and domestic peace-confirms the view of the containment of women’s creativity within a geography of separate spheres.” [5]

This sphere, as we can see, was the household. The World’s Fair shows us that women were not always staying at home, they also participated in important cultural events. The buildings constructed especially for them, however, showed that women’s field for activity and creativity was relegated to the home.

Even when enjoying their leisure time, women were inseparably connected to their household. This is seen, for instance, in a 1920s, advertising campaign of the American Laundry Machinery company. The campaign stressed the time saved by sending the family washing to a commercial laundry, and described the activities women might choose in this free time. Each ad usually included three or more illustrated testimonials in which women described the particular joys of their expanded leisure. [6] The most common activities turned out to be reading, spending more time with their children, sewing, home decoration and music.

All of these tasks allude to the sacred domain of the household. Some years later, between 1926 and 1928, another advertising campaign placed an even heavier emphasis on “more time to devote to your children” or “companionship with your children” as the most desirable benefit. [7] These surveys support the idea that advertisers then didn’t choose randomly the depiction of women either reading to their children or introducing them (especially if the child was a girl) to the household tasks from an early age. These were the activities women were occupied with during their leisure time.

This evidence could support the argument of Ruth Schwartz Cowan and others that new theories of child care had persuaded many women simply to shift their time from house maintenance to child nurture. [8]

Another important leisure-time "task" for women was to be companions to their husbands in the activities the men had decided to do. Women were advised by the magazines they read to finish their domestic chores faster by time-saving appliances and use their free time to being better housewives. To be a good wife equaled accompanying your husband wherever he decided to spend his free time. According to some articles in the McCall’s magazine from1959, women’s leisure time was normally connected with the plans of their husbands. According to the magazines, it was a pleasure to use up the free time you obtain in going somewhere with your counterpart. Thus, couples could do different things together and could enjoy their free time. The activities which married couples were supposed to do in their free time were either hunting or fishing, or just working together on the man’s tasks. [9]

The most striking thing about women’s free time and the things they wished to do was that no woman mentioned career in any of the testimonials from the survey of American Laundry Machinery. Women and career never existed together in the magazine articles in 1940-1960 either. It is true that there were some women who had jobs or who were having a “career” outside their homes, but the numbers of these women were far from equal compared to those of men. Most of the women living in the period from 1880 to 1960 built careers within their houses. Being a housewife was a job, an occupation and a career to them.

To be a good housewife and a good manager of your household was made by advertisers far more admirable job than any other occupation which women might have outside their home. In the 1930s’ advertising, homemaking was exalted as a career. [10] Every time advertisers wanted to dignify housework and show how important it was for women to build a career within their house, they resorted to business analogies.

There were many ads which stationed the housewife at the controls of a domestic communications center, and appended prestigious initials after her name in the same way that a professional man might add LL.D or M.D. [11]

American households were the businesses which were managed by women. When women were depicted in advertisements as planning their finances or paying bills, they were related to business executives and managers. The popular press was working as hard as possible to create a pleasing image of women’s roles in the household and to keep them in their realm, or maybe women were those not able to see themselves outside their homes, and the press was just showing this inability through ads and articles?

An article from the “Ladies’ Home Journal” in 1949, however, shows that there were women who doubted the self-fulfillment of their lives and the usefulness of the fact that they’d never been anything else but housewives. Such statements about wasted life within the home, unachieved career dreams were easily refuted by the eloquence of the people writing the articles for the women’s magazines. The disturbing statement that a housewife was always dependent on her husband to support her because of the fact that housewives were never ever in their lives able to earn any money was easily refuted by the answer that women were just fulfilling their moral obligations never to do anything for money.

Then to the statement that women felt inferiority complexes when they had to say or write down their occupation and they cannot write anything else except from occupation-housewife, the articles blamed women themselves for the fact that they perceived all the tasks they do as mere housekeeping.

A contemporary author claimed, for instance, that “The trouble with you-I said-is that you have to find one word to cover a dozen occupations all of which you follow expertly and all more or less simultaneously. You might write – business manager, cook, nurse, chauffeur, dress maker, interior decorator, accountant, caterer, teacher, private secretary- or just put down ‘philanthropist’ ”. [12]

These kind of articles suggested that, being a housewife, was the greatest, most humane, occupation. The home was the place where a woman could build the image of a prosperous person. Woman’s kingdom was her home, there she was not only responsible for everything, but she was also the one who had the last word to say about what had to be done and how. As another article from Haprer’s Bazaar in 1944 put it, “the time women have felt their own power in their own kingdoms they will know that they have never been slaves, except to a mistaken idea…” [13]

Women were those who had the right to decide which cereal their children should eat, they were the ones to decide what the three-meal menu for the day would be. Women managed household finances and had the right to vote for the best toothpaste.

When women were reading the newspapers about their domain they couldn’t feel anything else but pride about their achievements in society, about the career which they were able to establish within their homes. These were the messages which the popular press put across to its female readers. Those were the widely-accepted ideas about women in the 18^th century and in the mid 19^th century and their roles in society.

According to contemporary newspapers and magazines, women were independent and self-reliant. It is another point of discussion that today we can also read in the available sources from that time that women were advised to consider together with their husbands what to buy and how to plan all expenses conveniently[14], or that men used to reprimand their wives in it the same magazines and to teach them how to raise their children and to manage their household. [15] We can see in some advertisements husbands who stop-watched their wives to see how much time it takes them to clean with the new detergent they used, we can see that whenever a man was reading a newspaper at home on an advertisement, women were almost always depicted sitting behind and peeping.

To conclude, women’s roles in America in the period from 1870s to 1960s didn't fundamentally change. Sources like newspapers, advertisements and World Fairs reveal that women’s role in the household, and the widely-accepted idea of the home being their domain of job realization, did not change for almost a hundred years. Women were depicted and supposed to be best at being companions to husbands and children, successful in building a career within their homes, and extremely devoted to their household tasks. Women were just depicted as “philanthropies”.

Today we complain about women’s roles in society and their being neglected and under appreciated. But if we go back to the 30s and try to live the life which women used to live then, we will realize that the progress which women made from then on was a lot.

This paper shows that social norms and ideas doesn’t change for a day, sometimes even hundreds of years are not enough. It is our responsibility to preserve the already achieved goals and to expand progress until we reach absolute equality between the two genders.

P.S. What is more, judging by today's popular press and culture from the pictures below, we can see that gender roles are really changed (this time, however, not in the benefit of men) :) :) :)

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[1] David Scobey, What Shall We Do With Our Walls? The Philadelphia Centennial and the Meaning of Household Design, pp. 91

[2] Grace L. Pennok, Starting from Scratch, pp.147 “We asked Ginger if she ever kept Ted waiting because she forgot to put in the roast on time”; “Ted comes home about 5:30 p.m., so 4:30 is Ginger’s deadline for beginning the evening meal. She sets the table first so she’s sure not to forget things like filling the salt and pepper shakers”

Dorothy Fisher, Housekeeping Needn’t be Dull, pp. 150 “…decide what you have to spend, go ahead and do the buying-and then dismiss the whole matter of purchases from your mind for days, for weeks, for months. Don’t ever step into a shop “just to look around.””

[3] Dr. Carl Sherwin, The Question-Box, pp. 152 “Is honey more digestible than cane sugar?”; “What is the calorie value of apple butter? Of potato chips?”

[4] David Scobey, What Shall We Do With Our Walls? The Philadelphia Centennial and the Meaning of Household Design, pp. 115

[5] David Scobey, What Shall We Do With Our Walls? The Philadelphia Centennial and the Meaning of Household Design, pp. 96 – Tribune Guide,45

[6] Roland Marchand, Advertising the American Dream Making Way for Modernity, 1920-1940, pp. 171-172

[7] Roland Marchand, Advertising the American Dream Making Way for Modernity, 1920-1940, pp. 171-172

[8] Roland Marchand, Advertising the American Dream Making Way for Modernity, 1920-1940, pp. 171-172

[9] Selma Robinson, 103 Women Sound Off!, pp.186-187, “Their lives are lives of shared responsibilities and fun. Some fish and hunt with their husbands. Some are in business with them or pitch in when help is needed.”; “For a farmer’s wife like me, there is nothing more wonderful than following your husband on another tractor and feeling you are doing something together.”

[10] Roland Marchand, Advertising the American Dream Making Way for Modernity, 1920-1940, pp. 171

[11] Roland Marchand, Advertising the American Dream Making Way for Modernity, 1920-1940, pp. 169

[12] Dorothy Thompson, Occupation Housewife, pp.161

[13] M. F. K. Fischer, The Lively Art of Eating, pp. 160

[14] Dorothy Fisher, Housekeeping Needn’t Be Dull, pp.150

[15] Robert Knowlton, Your Wife Has an Easy Racket, pp. 170

Cited Works:

Fisher, Dorothy C. “Housekeeping Need Not Be Dull”. Ladies’ Home Journal (October, 1941). Walker, Nancy A. Women's Magazines,1940-1960 Gender Roles and the Popular Press, (Boston: Bedford, 1998).

Fisher, M. K. F. “The Lively Art of Eating”. Harper’s Bazaar (November,1944). Walker, Nancy A. Women's Magazines,1940-1960 Gender Roles and the Popular Press, (Boston: Bedford, 1998).

Wilder, Gene. Magic of the White City the World's Fair of 1893.(2005. Mark Bussler).[film]

Jones, Paul. “Is There a Plot against Women?”. Ladies’ Home Journal (July, 1954).

Walker, Nancy A. Women's Magazines,1940-1960 Gender Roles and the Popular Press, (Boston: Bedford, 1998).

Knowlton, Robert J. “Your Wife Has an Easy Racket!”. American Magazine (November, 1951). Walker, Nancy A. Women's Magazines,1940-1960 Gender Roles and the Popular Press, (Boston: Bedford, 1998).

Marchand, Roland. Advertising the American Dream Making Way for Modernity, 1920-1940. (Los Angeles: University of California Press; 1985).

Pennock, Grace L., “Starting From Scratch”. Ladies’ Home Journal (April, 1940). Walker, Nancy A. Women's Magazines,1940-1960 Gender Roles and the Popular Press, (Boston: Bedford, 1998).

Robinson, Selma. “103 Women Sound Off”. McCall’s (February, 1959). Walker, Nancy A. Women's Magazines,1940-1960 Gender Roles and the Popular Press, (Boston: Bedford, 1998).

Scobey, David. “What Shall We Do with Our Walls? The Philadelphia Centennial and the Meaning of Household Design”. Rydell Robert W.,Gwinn Nancy, Gilbert James B. Fair Representations: World's Fairs and the Modern World (Ed. Robert W. Rydell & Nancy Gwinn. Amsterdam: Amsterdam VU University Press, 1994).

Sherwin, Carl P. “The Question Box”. Good Housekeeping (January, 1944). Walker, Nancy A. Women's Magazines,1940-1960 Gender Roles and the Popular Press, (Boston: Bedford, 1998).

Thompson, Dorothy. “Occupation-Housewife”. Ladies’ Home Journal (March, 1949). Walker, Nancy A. Women's Magazines,1940-1960 Gender Roles and the Popular Press, (Boston: Bedford, 1998).

Whitbread, Jane and Cadden, Vivian. “Granny’s on the Pan”. Redbook (November, 1951). Walker, Nancy A. Women's Magazines,1940-1960 Gender Roles and the Popular Press, (Boston: Bedford, 1998).