Rosie and Mrs. America: Perceptions of Women in the 193s and 194sWho was Rosie and who was Mrs. America? They weren?t specific individuals; rather, they were symbols that defined perceptions of women during the 1930s and 1940s. The jubilance of the previous decade?the Roaring Twenties?was silenced by the stock market crash of 1929. Now the Great Depression challenged women in their homes, as Mrs. America had to learn how to ?make do? with less. And as men left for battle fronts, World War II propelled women to take their place in factories, becoming Rosie the Riveter. As girls and women of the 1930s and 1940s searched for their own identities, the media of the times tried to influence their paths. Magazine advertisements and mail-order catalogs showed women how to be both fashionable and frugal. Screwball comedies on the movie screen and the romantic soap operas on the radio portrayed women who took life lightly. But many women ignored these stereotypes and forged paths that women had never pursued before, in careers as pilots, foreign correspondents, musicians, and social activists. Learn more about the images and issues that framed perceptions about women in these difficult decades. |
Contents
Authors Note | 4 |
Prologue Inauguration Day March 4 1933 | 6 |
Chapter One Aint We Got Fun? | 14 |
Chapter Two Mrs America Goes to the Movies | 32 |
Chapter Three Fashions Passions | 54 |
Chapter Four Bylines and Headlines Women Who Write News Women Who Make News | 74 |
Chapter Five The Many Faces of Rosie | 100 |
Epilogue Mrs America Goes Home | 130 |
Source Notes | 134 |
| 137 | |
Further Reading and Websites | 139 |
Photo Acknowledgments | 143 |
About the Author | 144 |
Back Flap | 145 |
Back Cover | 146 |
Common terms and phrases
actress advertisements African American airplane all-girl American women Anna May Wong audience band baseball beauty Betty Boop Blondie boop-oop-a-doop Brenda Buck character Chinese cosmetics Cowan cream Dagwood dance Depression Didrikson dress editor Eleanor Roosevelt Entertainment factory fashion February female feminine film girl Gourley hair Hays Code Helen Kane Hollywood Home Journal http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article husband Ibid images Koremlu Lady Library of Congress lives look Lorena Hickok magazine Margaret Marian Anderson ment military mother movie musicians National never newspapers Nobel Prize Norman Rockwell nurses Paul Gallico Pearl Peggy Gilbert Peola photographs play popular Portia posters President Roosevelt radio recruitment reporter roles Rosie the Riveter Ruth screwball skirts smart soap opera social soldiers sportswriters star stereotypes stories Studios swing theater thousand United University Press Vogue Washington wear White House woman wore workers World World War II writing wrote York young