Wednesday, January 07, 2009

'50's House Wife

I just went to the book store today and looked at a book on aprons. My mom was given one by my aunt when I was 16 and I wore it till it was thread-bare. Now they are all the rage-- I am so happy about that. I am about to become 40 and my generation grew up with Clair Huxtable and modern women. We made fun of the '50's wives and how perky they were, but I was looking at all those pics today and some depicted them and they had grown up during the Great Depression! Modern conveniences were being created for the woman of the house, not just cars or factories. Microscopes were seeing things that no one had seen before and they obsessed over how they had survived before. Yes, the '50's hausfrau was OK to be happy.

6 comments:

steve on the slow train said...

David Halberstam wrote a wonderful book called "The Fifties." It's really a series of short essays about trends and personalities of that decade--McDonald's, Holiday Inn, the Beat Generation, McCarthyism, the Korean War, Levittown, early feminism, birth control, etc. It's a wonderful read and reminds you that the decade was far more complex than "Happy Days" portrayed it. I was seven when the decade ended, but the scattered memories of that world still fascinate me.

Rick Rockhill said...

what amazes me is how much we have advanced and changed in such a short amount of time, yet in other ways we are essentially the same

Olivia said...

One day I hope to own an apron. They can be quite handy, and save you from oil spots on clothing, at the very least.

Tea N. Crumpet said...

Happy Days was so awesome-- it was about a teenaged guy and his pals and their family. It didn't need to go outside that world.Rememebr when Ritchie dated the divorced woman? I had the same thing happen when I was 22 and dating-- I being dovorced with 2 kids and my date being 19.We were both sexually experienced but I was somehow more worldly and his mom was freaking out that he was going out with me. The date was a disaster-- we went out again a few weeks later,, agreeing to forget the first date!

When I think about out WWII had just gotten over and how the US was still trying to recover, still not comprehending what had happened in Germany, immigrants coming over, part of society trying to go back to what they knew as normal pre-WWII, part of society wanting to go forward-- out with the old, in with the new, I wish I could go back in time and experience it.

Naomi said...

when were aprons ever out of style? Every wife needs an apron!

Unknown said...

Maybe if I got an apron in which there is a funny text or something like that, I would have more inspiration to stay in the kitchen.
For example if I had one with a Ferdinand V quote (I am the emperor and I want dumplings) I would be in the kitchen all day. :D