Category:
Gender
The year 1850 was also a time when one large life insurance company's records showed its first policy issued to a female, reports the American Council of Life Insurance. She was one Caroline Ingraham, 36, of Madison, N.J. The policy register of November 19th, which contains the entry of Miss Ingraham's policy, lists her occupation as "Woman."
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2020/1850woman.jpg)
Dixon Evening Telegraph - Nov 19, 1976
The gimmick of this cookbook, published in 1971, was that it was striking a blow for Women's Lib by offering instructions for what both HIM and HER could do to prepare a meal.
From a review by James Boyett (pictured below):
The book details what the man is required to accomplish and what the better half is to do.
While most of the tasks the man is required to accomplish require only the knowledge of how to use a rolling pin or knife, I will warn you now that a couple of the recipes require the man to cook the meat — steak, pork chops.
One recipe, heaven forbid, asks the better half to only lay the table and then relax—while the man is required to open a couple of cans and then slave over a hot stove while "she" sips the fruit of the vine and relaxes.
More info:
Awful Library Books
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2020/1971cookbook03.jpg)
Abilene Reporter-News - Jan 23, 1972
Throughout the 20th century, it seemed to be widely assumed that the mood of the husband was determined by the behavior of his wife at home. So, concluded the District of Columbia's traffic safety office in 1963, if a man was in a 'disgruntled disposition' and consequently got into a traffic accident, it must have been the fault of his wife who didn't cheer him up adequately when he left home with a goodbye kiss "as though she meant it."
See also:
Whose fault is it when your husband is cross at breakfast?
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2020/1963kisses.jpg)
Minneapolis Star - Nov 12, 1963
A controversial billboard for air conditioning recently appeared in Nottingham. It declared, "Your wife is hot."
According to the BBC:
Prof Carrie Paechter, director of the Nottingham Centre for Children, Young People and Families, said the advert was "like something out of the 1950s" and called for it to be removed.
This made me wonder, which 1950s-era ad exactly was it like? Perhaps the
"recipe for boiled wife" ad that we recently posted about.
As one of the first female truckers, Edna Ruth Lievsay was a social pioneer. One of her biggest obstacles, however, turned out not to be the trucking company, or the other drivers, but the wives of the other drivers, who refused to let their husbands drive with her, claiming she represented ‘temptation’.
In 1977, 200 of the wives joined together to form a group called “Truckers Families United Unlimited, Inc.” and sued to try to force the company to allow their husbands to refuse to drive with Lievsay. The judge ruled that they had failed to state a valid complaint.
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2019/1977trucker01.jpg)
El Paso Times - May 14, 1977
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2019/1977trucker03.jpg)
The Tennessean - May 6, 1977
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2019/1977trucker02.jpg)
Washington Court House Record-Herald - May 16, 1977
Written by Dave Fougner and published in 1972. Recently back in print.
Available from Amazon.
Dave Fougner is six-foot-two, plays tennis, raises horses and shows them, teaches fifth and sixth grades at Steele Lane School, has real estate and air plane pilot licenses, is married and has a family. His hobby? Knitting!... Dave, a big, genial, friendly man of 28 says, "I like to knit in bed watching television."
Jennifer, his blonde wife, and Christa, their three-year-old, sat in on the interview at the Fougner (pronounced foe-gner) home on Loch Haven Drive. Jennifer laughed and added, "I don't knit."
On a marble table near me (the couple also collects antique furniture, refinishing it when they have some free time) lay a copy of Dave's book, "The Manly Art of Knitting," a picture of him astride Jennifer's beautiful registered Palomino quarter horse, Fore's Dandy, on the cover. You have to look twice before you realize that he's knitting atop the horse...
"One reason I wrote the book was to encourage men to try knitting. There's a doctor in town who knits. It's amazing how many men do but are afraid to admit it..."
And knitting was primarily a man's job before the Industrial Revolution, he said. "Knitting was an art. An apprentice knitter served six years."
— The Santa Rosa Press Democrat - Apr 8, 1973
An eco-feminist, anti-Barbie doll featuring tattoos, unshaven legs, pierced nipples, pubic hair, and dreadlocks. Created by Lee Duncan of Australia in 1995.
Duncan still has a few Feral Cheryls available for sale at her website
feralcheryl.com.au. They're going for $75 AUD (about 57 US dollars).
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2018/1995cheryl01.jpg)
Palm Beach Post - May 31, 1995
Given the point she was trying to make, seems like it would have been more appropriate to drag her husband as he reclined in a rickshaw, or something along those lines.
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2018/1997cross01.jpg)
Baltimore Sun - July 21, 1997
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2018/1997cross02.jpg)
The Guardian - July 22, 1997
In August 1962, New York City cops began patrolling the streets at night while dressed as women. The idea was to trap would-be muggers.
But not all the decoy cops were successful at apprehending the muggers. Patrolman Victor Ortiz got hit over the head by a mugger, lost his gun, and his assailant got away.
Update: Author Erika Janik discusses Operation Decoy in her book
Pistols and Petticoats: 175 Years of Lady Detectives in Fact and Fiction. She places it within the context of an ongoing resistance within the police department during the mid-twentieth century to the idea of having female police officers:
By the 1960s, this attitude had become entrenched in police administration and law enforcement literature. Police Juvenile Enforcement declared that while a policewoman could be an asset, "a female officer is not a necessity."
Some even went so far as to suggest that male officers could simply dress as women for undercover work. In 1962, eight male officers did just that in order to trap muggers and rapists in New York City. "We want our men to look like housewives, not like Hollywood stars," explained Inspector Michael Codd, head of the tctical force. Twenty-seven-year-old patrolman Victor Ortiz wore white sandals, orange tapered pants, and a beige padded sweater on top of a bright print blouse. On hand to help the officers get ready were two policewomen, Caryl Collins and Dolores Munroe. The women stood by in their official uniforms as the men posed for the TV and newspaper cameras. Why teaching men to wear heels and put on lipstick was deemed more useful than simply deploying policewomen seems a question the reporters never asked. It's true that decoys did get attacked as part of these operations (that was the point), but all officers worked in teams with detectives standing by to apprehend suspects. In this instance, two of the disguised policemen had their purses snatched in Central Park and seven people were arrested in the overnight anti-mugging operation.
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2018/1962decoy01.jpg)
Orlando Evening Star - Aug 25, 1962
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2018/1962decoy02.jpg)
Greenville News - Aug 24, 1962
![](https://www.weirduniverse.net/images/2018/1962decoy04.jpg)
Allentown Morning Call - Aug 28, 1962
A guide published by the Radio Corporation of America circa 1943.
Source:
imgur via
reddit.