Childless in the Golden Era

[Lady Day]

As I mature, Im looking around and seeing all my peers pair up and start families. While I wish them well, I begin to wonder if I will do the same. I often get those questions from family; "When are you going to get married?" "When are you going to start a family?" I often take comfort in the times we have now when being 30 you didn't have to have a 7 year old on his was to school.

But these thoughts made me wonder about women and men in the Golden Era who didn't have this modern choice. It was expected of them to pair up and have families, yet we all know of that friend of the family, or aunt or uncle who didn't marry or have kids, and it makes me wonder what life was like for them.

I had an aunt, great Aunt Clare, graceful woman, easily could have had 10 husbands, but didn't have children. Perhaps she couldn't. I guess that made her a 'spinster' or what ever stigma Im sure was associated with a woman during those decades. Yet she was the most educated, well traveled, witty woman I knew. By brother and I would often go over to her home and although we were 6 and 7, she never talked to us like children. She would ask our opinions on current events and philosophies (phrased for kids of course), and genuinely listen to our replies. She fueled the creative streak in me. This makes me wonder, am I destined to be this type of woman?

I have no desire to have children, and while this is near socially acceptable now, I wonder how it was perceived in those times. Im not talking 'having as many kids as you can to make into farm hands' perception, but the ongoing 'biological duty' of having children and the 'something must be wrong with you' stigma to people who choose not to have families.

Did people choose not to have families in the Golden Era?
How were the people in your family who didn't pair off received by the family?
Any still alive now?

Im curious to hear stories, or site research if you know of any.

LD

 

[Paisley]

I used to have a dear friend who never married. She must have been born around 1940. She worked with a lot of Air Force Academy cadets (still does, I see from a Google search); she's one of the warmest, kindest people I've ever known. At one time, she was engaged, but she told me she didn't have any regrets about the life she chose. I never asked her about other peoples' reactions

My parents were born around 1930 and they've never made any comments to me about not having kids or getting married. None--ever. Same as an 80-year-old friend of mine: she's never made a comment to her childless son or daughter. She feels it's not her place.

In fact, my father made a comment while we were watching a movie where a woman's parents were trying to set her up: "That doesn't work."

 

[Paisley]

I had an aunt, great Aunt Clare, graceful woman, easily could have had 10 husbands, but didn't have children. Perhaps she couldn't. I guess that made her a 'spinster' or what ever stigma Im sure was associated with a woman during those decades. Yet she was the most educated, well traveled, witty woman I knew. By brother and I would often go over to her home and although we were 6 and 7, she never talked to us like children. She would ask our opinions on current events and philosophies (phrased for kids of course), and genuinely listen to our replies. She fueled the creative streak in me. This makes me wonder, am I destined to be this type of woman?

When you don't have the responsibilities of kids, you have more time and money to travel and read think about things that don't have to get done immediately. (In contrast, my 80-year-old friend raised two kids by herself for 15 years after her husband ran off. She described it as "always on overload.") Maybe your aunt didn't have preconceived ideas about how to talk to kids, either, and so treated you and your brother like little adults.

 

[Lady Day]

Maybe your aunt didn't have preconceived ideas about how to talk to kids, either, and so treated you and your brother like little adults.

I think she talked to us that way not because she didnt know 'how' to talk to us like children, but she chose not to. She was around lots of kids. She was one of 16, and all the other siblings had kids and grandkids, so she was always around family and children.

LD

 

[Elaina]

The people I named my son after, and whom I refer to as my grandparents, were in fact childless. It was heart breaking to my Aunt, but she and my Uncle Casey chose not to adopt. She was an alcoholic (not a secret, there's the Barbara Casey memorial room in one of the larger AA meeting houses in Dallas after her) and she had an interesting life. Hers was due to being a mirror twin and it was always said my Aunt Butch should have been the sterile one. My Aunt died when I was 17, old enough for me to ask to name my son Casey after her and my Uncle, and she said she didn't miss having her own kids because my mom, dad and I were better then anything she could hope for.

My Grandpa Rick (not really related, but heck he's been my dad's best friend for 50 years and turned 93 on St. Patty's day) never married or had kids. He's been perceived as a sort of honorable man who had to take care of his mother...and Mama P. lived to be 107!

In my family, we don't exactly come from stock that gives a hoot what anyone thinks. You don't like it, there's the door. I had several older relatives, male and female, that would flat tell you they didn't like children and didn't want some bratty twit. I also had some that would have liked them, but didn't, and even then it was what it was. We didn't have stigmas in the family. They may not have had kids, or liked them, and that was that. They never said if it was a choice or not, but at least some of them I assume it was.

I knew a woman that never married or had children due to her beau dying in WWII. While she was regretful this happened, and was considered to be "queer" in all sense of the word (she lived with her best friend until they both went to the old folk's home, and still shared a room then) and it was just whispered about town, not that anyone said anything to her. She was very realistic about it. She had a full and happy life, that she did for herself, and the rest of the naysayers could stick it. Another woman I knew, Edna, prided herself on being a spinster schoolteacher...and all three of these women were little balls of fire as old women, I can't imagine what they were like as young ones. 2 of them chose not to marry or have children. The other woman that was there, was married for 63 years, and never had a child by choice. Miss Mabel was African-American and when I asked her why one day she chose not to because she said it was hard being black and she wanted more for her children, and never saw it changing enough to put her kids through the troubles she had. The other woman I took care of, Mrs. G., refused to have them because she spent the depression taking care of her 3 brothers and sister and wouldn't do it. I can't imagine anyone really telling any of these women what they should or shouldn't do without a fight on their hands.

Out of all of these, my Grandpa Rick is the only one still alive.

Now, I'm the one with one child, and I'm keeping it that way. I have siblings with 3, 5 and 7 kids and I get asked occasionally when I'm going to have more or remarry. Usually I get snotty about it (I've told a sister I'd have more when she quit being a breeding cow) and it gets dropped. Mostly they think I need to watch their kids at their convenience and usually it's with the remark "You're single and only have one kid so I'm sure it's not a bother..." as they try to tell me I am going to do it. They try to place a stigma on me about it and how selfish I am for not wanting a husband and a soccer team, and I don't care enough to worry with it, which is what I've seen in the attitudes of people of this generation.

 

[Shangas]

If you were childless in the golden era, I think there was a fair stigma stamped on it. Between the four of them, my two sets of grandparents had about a dozen kids between them. How the hell they ever fed so many mouths, I've no idea, but they did.

Coming from a Chinese family, there is still a pretty strong expectation (from parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, etc), that you WILL marry, you WILL have kids, and you WILL add another branch to the family tree. In traditional Chinese culture, not getting married and popping out kids (especially sons), is considered an insult to the family name and to your ancestors. Not too long ago, a cousin of mine got married. Quicker than you could sneeze, my aunt was on his back, asking him when he was going to have his first grandson (and after that, when he planned to have the first granddaughter, and third grandchild, etc, etc, etc).

My grandmother is 95 years old. She's lived through two world wars, a communist uprising and a global depression, but she still asks me every single time when I'm going to get a girl and settle down and pop out kids.

If it's like this in the 21st century, I can imagine back in the 1920s, 30s and 40s, when my grandparents were young adults, the pressure to get married and have kids would have been even stronger than it is today.

When WWII came along in 1939, my grandmother told me a story of how she gave away one of her daughters (one of my aunts), to one of her sisters. My great-aunt was unmarried and a virgin when the Japanese invaded Malaya and Singapore in 1942, and the common belief was that Japanese soldiers would rape virgin women. To save her sister from this fate, my grandmother (who by that time already had four children from her husband's previous marriage), gave away one of their very young step-daughters, so that my aunt would look like a widowed mother with a little daughter.

 

[LizzieMaine]

My Aunt Edie, the former longshoreman/shoe factory worker I've sometimes spoken about, never had children. She married a very likable fellow who was a bit too fond of the Bottle, and I think they both realized that kids would not be a good fit for their situation -- I was only 9 when "Uncle Rosie," as he was known, passed away, so I don't know the specifics of what steps they took to ensure that there would be no youngsters, but knowing my aunt, I'm pretty sure it was more her decision than his.

Aunt Edie is still alive and fiesty at age 89. Her husband died nearly forty years ago, but she never considered remarrying, and has been perfectly happy to live alone in the same little house they shared ever since. She lives just up the street from my mother, and Ma runs errands for her when necessary, but most of the time she takes care of herself -- she can be seen walking to the store in the snow and rain, and often has sharp remarks for anyone who presumes to offer her a ride or otherwise implies she's infirm. If anyone ever had anything to say about her situation, they never dared to say it to her face.

There was an older gentleman on our street when I was young who had never married. He lived quietly with his sister and her husband, and always kept to himself -- he'd say hello when he saw you on the street, but there were never extended conversation, and while no one was hostile to him, people tended to keep their distance. It wasn't until I was grown up that I found out that he was gay.

I never had kids myself -- I had problems that made it impossible for me to have them myself, and I never considered adoption because we never could have afforded kids anyway. So I expect to end up like Aunt Edie myself, if I live that long, yelling at kids to get off my lawn.

 

[Lorena B]

Here in Spain, the situation in the 40's and 50's were different.
As my parents explained me, as there was little information about sex and the anticonceptives were rare to get, mainly the people that were childless were the people that couldnt for health reasons, and in case that it was for personal choice, that was also the reason given, been unable to have them. Other cases also like widows/wers, lovers... as they were unmarried, society didnt have this sort of "friendships" in good concept and furthermore having children in these circunstances was a no go situation.

 

[Carlisle Blues]

Modern society hasn't resolved the issue of how the working mother can be fully competitive in the job market when she is also trying to bring up children. More stress on the parenting responsibilities of the father can help, but even if the father shares fully fifty percent of the child-rearing burden, this still leaves that working mother (as well as her husband, in this case) at a competitive disadvantage, vis-a-vis the unmarried or childless individual who may be competing for the same job.

I don't know how our society is going to resolve this problem. My own preferred solution is to socially sanction what I call the "Aunty Principle", where being childless is just fine, and many adults act as aunts or uncles rather than having children themselves. They would maintain a close and special relationship to certain growing children, perhaps parented by a sibling, perhaps just in something like the old "godparent" relationship. Other individuals, those who feel a strong impulse to reproduce biologically should do so, and could have large families, say four or five children. They should be supported by the state, as well as by assorted aunts, uncles, godfathers, and godmothers, so that they can live a decent life and provide a good education for their children even though they are not able to compete as effectively in the job market as the others. I see this as a kind of moral common sense that might grow naturally in our society, not as something imposed by diktat, either government or whatever. It could end up with most children growing up in an environment like our ancestors did, ie with several siblings rattling around, and with the further profoundly important benefit that each child brought into the world will be wanted, and will be given a decent shot at making the most of his talents. (see The Eternal Woman)

However, the flip side is expressed here: Those who choose not to have children tend to be well educated, live in urban areas, marry late and work outside the home; as a group, they are not actively religious. They fall into two categories: the deliberate types and the postponers. In general, the former make their decision early in life, often after perceiving their own mothers' lives as restrictive and unfulfilling. A disproportionate number are only children or firstborns who had to care for younger brothers and sisters.

However, outright regret is not unusual. Despite three nephews, a golden retriever and a cat, Suzanne Childs, 45, a twice-divorced Los Angeles lawyer, says, "Knowing what I know now, I would have married someone different and had a child."

Other women feel the same way. New York Psychologist Felice Gans regularly hears "anticipatory regret" from female patients in their early 30s. Says Gans: "They ask, 'Will I regret this? What is wrong with me that I didn't want a baby all along?' " (She notes, however, that she also counsels many women who regret having had children.) Some discontented women blame feminism for encouraging their childless state. Feminist Author Betty Friedan, who relishes her role as the mother of two children, sharply disagrees. She insists that feminists are addressing the problems of working mothers. "Half of the women who are childless at 40 are not childless by real choice," says Friedan. "They have not had children because they are in male-structured jobs with no good day care available."

A backlash of sorts against childlessness may have already begun: the birth rate among college-educated women 20 to 24 years old is beginning to climb. Nonetheless, the decision to have or not to have children is a profound one. Says Yankelovich: "Society is accepting childlessness, but some women question whether they have violated a biological law." Most childless adults who have deliberately made the choice enjoy their freedom with few misgivings. But some of those who find themselves sitting on the fence may have already made a decision they did not intend to make. ( see The Dilemmas of Childlessness By Martha Smilgis)

The bottom line this is not endemic to woman. The choice between societal pressures, occupational hazards and family tradition runs deep with both sexes. The dilemma can be overwhelming and the final choice haunting.

 

[Paisley]

I think [my aunt] talked to us that way [like adults] not because she didnt know 'how' to talk to us like children, but she chose not to.

Good for her! I never liked silly baby talk when I was a kid.

 

[Lusti Weather]

I have never wanted children, and have wondered about this issue myself. While she was doubtlessly the exception, I remember seeing a '50s TV interview with burlesque legend Lili St. Cyr where she stated that she had no desire for a family and that she believed women had children because they had nothing else going on in their lives. So there were women who were vocal about choosing to be childless, though I doubt many would have gone on the record with their statements like Ms. St. Cyr!

On a closer-to-home level, my mother always told me that I reminded her of one of her aunts, a librarian who chose never to marry or have children. I never knew her myself though -- too bad, since she sounds like she would have been cool!

 

[Big Man]

My aunt Hazel, who died three years ago at age 98, was never married. She was my Dad's sister, and was 17 years older than my Dad. After she died, my Dad was talking to me about Hazel and said that she had a serious boyfriend in her younger days and was planning on getting married. However, when my grandfather died in 1932 (my dad was just 7 years old at the time) Hazel "put her life on hold" to help take care of things at home.

I never heard my aunt Hazel speak a word of regret about not being married. She was more of a mother to my Dad than a sister, and more of a mother to me than an aunt. I am sure she would have been happy in married life, and would still have been a good daughter, sister, and aunt. But, she chose to sacrifice her own personal happiness for the sake of her family. She will always have a special place in my heart for that.

 

[Helysoune]

I had an aunt, great Aunt Clare, graceful woman, easily could have had 10 husbands, but didn't have children. Perhaps she couldn't. I guess that made her a 'spinster' or what ever stigma Im sure was associated with a woman during those decades. Yet she was the most educated, well traveled, witty woman I knew. By brother and I would often go over to her home and although we were 6 and 7, she never talked to us like children. She would ask our opinions on current events and philosophies (phrased for kids of course), and genuinely listen to our replies. She fueled the creative streak in me.

My Aunt Joanie was just this way, too. She married young and when Uncle Wade passed after too few years of marriage, she never remarried or even dated, but moved back home to live with and help her mother. I have to say that she is largely responsible for my Golden Era addiction, as she LOVED old movies, especially musicals, and would usually have one or another on when we'd go to visit her and Great-Grandma. Never, ever, ever did she talk down to me when I was little, and I can remember sitting so still, listening in awe to her talk about going out dancing and such in the old days, and how things used to be. I have two vintage aprons I got when she passed on (as well as two giant boxes of kitchen gadets, cookbooks, etc.) and wear one or the other nearly every day. Even toward the end of her life, she was always perfectly coiffed, made up, dressed and accessorized, even if she just happened to be at home in a housecoat. She taught me truly what it meant to keep a house and garden and how to be a lady doing so. I could swear that sometimes she and my great-grandmother pop in now and then with a little nod of approval.

 

[Paisley]

If someone regrets not having kids, the question is whether she's unhappy because she wants kids but can't have any, or if she wants kids because she's unhappy. In the latter case, there are things you can do to make yourself happy that require a lot less time, money and effort than a baby.

The idea that having children shouldn't involve any tradeoffs seems to have come about in the last 20 or so years. I think men have accepted the tradeoff idea for many, many generations now. Quitting a good but dull job to do something more interesting like travel or play in a bar band just wasn't a good option for an average guy with a bunch of mouths to feed.

 

[Paisley]

I remembered my Aunt A. last weekend. No kids: her husband made her have three abortions.

 

[Carlisle Blues]

Quitting a good but dull job to do something more interesting like travel or play in a bar band just wasn't a good option for an average guy with a bunch of mouths to feed.

Sometimes having a good, but, dull job is not enough. A second job may be necessary. Maybe as a travel agent or a musician.

 

[jamespowers]

I don't think it is necessarily the stigma associated with it but you certainly have to have an end of life plan way ahead of time. I have seen far too many cases of childless elderly people who were taken advantage of by not only relatives but people in general because they had no one supervising their care or finances. My aunt Emma was a case in point. Her and my Uncle Joe moved to a warmer area due to her arthiritis but after Uncle Joe died and she was alone for many years---except for my deadbeat cousin. If it wasn't for my mother going down there and taking over her affairs she would have been in a bad way.
The worst part was that she was a very private person who only told her brother about what she wanted etc. After he predeceased her, she didn't alert the next in line and pass on important information. :eusa_doh: My mother had to start from scratch when she was already in a resthome. :eusa_doh: It was quite an ordeal as I was with her when she first went down and tried to get everything straightened out. Things you take for granted----like getting into your safety deposit box and such were a real pain.
So what I am saying is get your affairs in order and have a plan before you truly need it. It is far better than getting stuck at the end.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Very good point. I had a childless great-uncle who was the stereotypical Flinty New England Mean Old Miser -- and he when he died, all the surviving relatives swarmed on his house with wrecking bars, axes, and sledgehammers to find where he'd hidden his loot. His sister slashed open his mattress with a straight razor, where she found about $20,000 in small bills, which was more money than any of us had ever seen in one place. By then the house had been pretty much demolished, and as far as I know she kept the cash. I imagine it's sewn in *her* mattress to this day.

As for me, I've had a will since I was in my 30s, even though I own absolutely nothing of any value to anyone except possibly the people on this board. When I kick off, there'll be a really big auction, so be sure to get bids in early...

 

[jamespowers]

As for me, I've had a will since I was in my 30s, even though I own absolutely nothing of any value to anyone except possibly the people on this board. When I kick off, there'll be a really big auction, so be sure to get bids in early...

You might just outlive us all so I am not going to count on that. lol lol lol
Will I have to get my crowbar?

 

[Miss Neecerie]

This is actually a good point for -everyone-, since having kids or being married does not actually guarantee the person or persons you have told your wishes to:

a. listens to you
b. does not precede you


Everyone, should have all this stuff settled, regardless of marital or parental status.