In 1955 Mrs. Dale Carnegie, whose husband wrote the best-seller “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” advised her fellow housewives: “The two big steps that women must take are to help their husbands decide where they are going and use their pretty heads to help them get there. Let’s face it, girls. That wonderful guy in your house – and in mine – is building your house, your happiness and the opportunities that will come to your children.”
Women were second-rate members of society and marriage in the 1950s. Those who went out to work were relegated to low-paying clerical, nursing, teaching, and domestic jobs, and to even lower-paying jobs for the nearly invisible Black female population. The newspaper want-ads had a separate section for women. The same type of humiliation existed in higher education, where many medical schools, law schools, and graduate schools were rejecting the “frivolous” applications of women, while female undergraduate students were often said to be pursuing an M.R.S. (Mrs.) degree.
– Salon