Domestic Responsibilities

The 1955-1956 State's Mates yearbook cover depicting home life for many of its members.

On the cover of the States Mates yearbook from 1956, a cartoon of housewife juggling her home typified the everyday life of a States Mates member. The illustration shows her husband sitting comfortably reading a book and unwinding with an unidentified bottled drink. Contrastingly, his wife is stirring dinner with her right hand, barely holding onto an upside-down baby in her left hand, and having her dress tugged on by a needy toddler. There are toys lying about the room; and the laundry is hanging from a clothesline outside of the kitchen window. Although this depiction of life seems exaggerated, for the members of States Mates this was their everyday life.

According to the Parsonian model of the “nuclear family,” the roles of the parents, although equally important to the socialization of children, were based on biology, temperament, and aptitude. Women’s nurturing role was complementary to men’s role as family provider. In other words, women were homemakers; men were breadwinners. However, for the members of State’s Mates, their husband’s were not yet the breadwinners; they were students on track to a career. Now having to make up for this shift in roles, the situation that many of the State’s Mates found themselves in was very complex. On the one hand, State’s Mates members could relate to housewives because they were in charge of all domestic duties—cooking, cleaning, raising the children (if they had them)—as well as sustaining a happy relationship with their husbands. One the other hand, State’s Mates could relate to single-parent families, whether a product of divorce or death, because they were responsible for domestic, familial, and financial responsibilities while their husbands were disconnected from the family because their attentions were focused on their education.

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