I’m so excited! My sister and her husband are having a baby! The entire family had a lively discussion about names during Thanksgiving dinner. If it’s a boy, he will be named after his papa; the girl’s name is still not finalized. There were as many opinions as people there, but we all know that […]
Tag: 1920s
Toilet Training Trouble
Q Dear Miss Abigail: I’m having trouble toilet training my three-year-old son. Any suggestions? I’ve tried just about everything. He has the urine down, but the other is just an obstacle for some reason. Signed, Exasperated Mom A Dear Mom: I realize some of my readers might be turned off by this week’s question, but […]
Childishness in Women
I have found something written ~ according to the publisher’s note from The Art of Making a Perfect Husband ~ “by a bonafide husband whose identity we are for obvious reasons not at liberty to divulge.” They continue: “It is cynical, but not only as truth itself is cynical, for this author has the courage to […]
The Erring Husband
[Note to readers: this one was posted originally back in the heat of the Lewinsky scandal, if you didn’t guess that already…] Bill Clinton, Bill, Bill, Bill, Bill, Bill, Bill. Sigh. You sure are giving husbands a bad name, now, aren’t you? What to do? What to do? Perhaps this bit of advice to wives […]
Etiquette for Engaged People
I’m just bursting with joy! My baby sister Jennifer Grotke and her wonderful guy Tony Perez announced their engagement this week, so of course I had to check out some advice for the recently engaged. This is from Lillian Eichler’s Etiquette in Public, first published in 1924. Congrats to the happy couple! 1924: Etiquette for Engaged […]
Platonic Relationship = Happiness?
Q Dear Miss Abigail: I have a fantastic friendship with a woman, which has been going on for a over five years now. Though I have dated other women, and she other men, we remain strictly platonic, much to the surprise of our friends and respective families. We love each other, but only as friends. […]
Love is a Species of Drunkenness
This time I bring you an excerpt from the anonymously written book (I eventually found out the author was none other than composer Cyril Scott) titled The Art of Making a Perfect Husband. Cause if love is just a lottery, we still have a chance! A one in a million chance, but that counts, doesn’t it? 1929: […]
The Growth of Love
Girl loves boy. Boy loves girl. But before they take that next step, they might want to ask these questions from Dr. Keller’s Love, Courtship, Marriage. 1928: The Growth of Love The young woman studies a certain young man who is paying her a great deal of attention, and intuitively she asks herself the same questions […]
Now What, Really, Is Love?
Happy Valentine’s Day, folks. Here’s a quote about love to help you celebrate the day; it’s from Elinor Glyn’s This Passion Called Love. Smooches, everyone! I love you! Really, I do! 1925: Now What, Really, Is Love? We are here talking of love between the sexes ~ that is, the state of being ‘in love’ ~ […]
Ideal Love
It might just be the weather, but I think that love is in the air! We are all searching for it . . . 1923: Ideal Love Being in love is merely a physical state of exaltation; loving is the merging of the spirit which at its white heat has glorified the physical instinct for re-creating into […]