When Everything Changed: The Amazing Journey of American Women from 1960 to the Present by Gail Collins
It’s all there in the subtitle; When Everything Changed is a comprehensive overview of how women’s lives have changed. It opens in 1960, with a woman being kicked out of traffic court (she was there to pay her boss’s fine) because she was wearing slacks. Think the sexism we see in Mad Men is overstated? Holy cow, if anything, it’s underplayed. Journalist Gail Collins takes us on a journey, through news reports, court cases, and personal reminiscences from a great variety of women, that begins in the most deeply institutionalized sexism. From there we travel into the beginnings of the women’s movement, the publication of significant books, the forming of significant organizations, radicalization, schism, backlash, the works. And through it all, those personal stories, keeping it real.
So sometimes, you’ll shake your head and say “Wow.” Other times, you’ll have a memory sparked and say, “Oh, yeah! That’s right!” And late in the book, if you’re media savvy and pay attention to the world around you, you might get bored, because it’s all stuff you read the first time. But the overall effect is outstanding. Reading When Everything Changed from beginning to end offers something like a sense of the massive scope and impact of the women’s movement.
Collins avoids a lot of pitfalls. She doesn’t swallow conventional wisdom about the women’s movement, doesn’t denigrate feminism, but doesn’t overlook flaws in the way people have behaved. My sense, reading her, is of a remarkably smart and fair-minded writer with a deft command of prose.
For Basketcases, there is terrific material here, a wonderful learning experience about our era and what followed. We see young Bettys and Peggys and even Suzannes, and Sallys, and we see them grow up and change. There’s Sally, going off to college and becoming a lesbian separatist, and there’s Betty, understanding, or not understanding, or becoming one herself.
The book marches boldly to the present day, to the 2008 elections, with two major female candidates, but doesn’t pretend that means sexism has gone away. Collins is smart and sees the world clearly, both the progress and the world ahead.
Definitely recommended.
20 Responses to “Book Review: When Everything Changed”
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Ah, the battle over pants for women — no less, the later "pants suit" — raged for over a decade — disallowed in grammer, junior high and high school, up to the late '60s in my neighborhood.
As a young girl freezing through snow days to school in a dress ('leggings" were allowed, but had to be separate legs, removed before class, and were, as you can imagine, a royal pain in the ass for child and parents alike.)
Older, knee socks with skirt, or tights were the only substitutes. And there was no layering of socks over tights, leg warmers etc. considered fashionable.
I'm only surprised that it was my brother who developed pneumonia three times, and not me, who still hates the cold with a passion.
First year of college, we college "girls" were "allowed" to wear the equivalent of dress pants to class, but not jeans!
Can you imagine college classes with no jeans?
And that, boys and girls, was just the battle over keeping your legs warm as a female — so you can imagine the wars fought over anything more substantial.
I am actually responsible for the Closter, NJ grammar schools allowing girls to wear pants. This was, hmmm, 1969 or so. Girls were not allowed to wear pants. On gym days, we could bring pants to class, change, and then change back afterwards.
But really, I always had such a hard time getting out of bed, and I never had the few extra minutes to pack a change of clothes. So one day I wore pants to school on a gym day. No one said anything and I didn't get into trouble. Seeing that, another girl wore pants, and then another. It was a silent revolution.
Perhaps that's what happened in the years after I left my (public) high school to open up the dress code — but up to 1968 when I graduated, any variance from the dress code and the girl was sent home from school.
(Knew one girl forced to kneel in front of the principal to prove that her skirt touched the floor and wasn't too far above the knee. No minis allowed!)
A second offense to the dress code and she (or he) was suspended from school, in the days when that was considered a very big deal.
But as I recall, after Freshman year in college (1970) all bets were off on campus.
We also had to buy very ugly "gym suits" wrinkled cotton shorts onesies with a fabric belt to wear for gym.
Couldn't kick a ball without wearing the gym suit, although they were left to fester and stink in lockers without washing for months at a time
But they left no opportunity to bring or wear the dreaded pants to school.
When I was in junior high school in the San Francisco Bay Area in 1967 girls could wear pants to school, but only if they had parental approval and had received a "pants pass" from the school principal. Any girl wearing pants had to show her "pants pass" if asked by a school official.
The official "pants pass" policy slowly died after the secretaries in the main office complained about how many "pants passes" had to be reissued because they did not survive the washer and dryer!
I read the book and it was fantastic. I would highly reccomend it to anyone who wants to more about the women's rights movement/women's liberation/this time period in American history. In the book, Collins mentions women who were copywriters wearing hats, so they would not be mistaken for secretaries. Have we ever seen Peggy in a hat in the office/when she arrives at or leaves the office?
We've never seen the hat thing, but Peggy has no female copywriter role models; she's the only one at SC, and she's never worked at another agency.
I've seen Peggy in a hat at work. I think it's the same hat as in this picture:
http://z.about.com/d/tvdramas/1/0/9/i/mads3-peggy…
But it's true she doesn't wear them every day. Also, remember Valley of the Dolls? Barbara Parkins played a secretary, I'm pretty sure, and she wore a hat. That was 1967. I think her job was in publishing rather than advertising, though.
As late as the early '70s I remember reading about women barred from fancy-smancy restaurants and other hoity toity venues for wearing "pants suits" (matching jacket and pants.)
In any case, up through the '60s you never saw women in pants of any kind at local (New Jersey) suburban churches, although people from "the city" (New York City) summering introduced some of the newer fashions, including a see-through blouse (with opaque pockets) that had quite the effect on the teenage boys who worked in the local supermarket.
I also affected "hot pants" one summer in, say, '70, but our little suburb was otherwise quite the backwater.
I remember my first "real" job in the mid 80s — a management training program with AT&T. We were only allowed to wear pants, or rather, slacks (NEVER jeans), on casual day. The few women in the program wore the standard 1980s career uniform: boxy blazer with monstrous shoulder pads and a skirt (the "man's suit" made for a woman) worn with the floppy bow-tie/scarf at the neck. Think Ally Sheedy in St. Elmo's Fire…or even this. LOL. I think I even had the same haircut. Heh. I'm sure if I looked really hard at my mom's house, I could find a picture of me looking exactly like that ad. So glad I realized that was NOT the career path I wanted.
Anyhoo…I haven't read the book, although it does sound interesting. Does it touch on some of the issues that women of color have had to deal with, or is this just an exploration of the Peggy's, Joan's, and Betty's of the world?
Does Joan wear a hat? Have we really seen any of the women in hats, other than Rachel? I suppose hers more than compensated for the others' lack of one.
I'm not sure about Joan. But Mona has worn hats–her ensemble for coming to the office & calling out Jane included a fetching number. And Jane's shown up in hats–after she became a married lady! (At the calamitous Derby party & when she "dropped by" the office.") Trudy has worn several charming/odd hats. And Peggy has a cute little number that makes her look about 12 years old.
Betty should have worn a hat to the Derby party. But she already took up enough space with her white lace maternity dress; and leading ladies sometimes show up hatless to they'll stand out more. (Not that she had any problems "standing out" in those scenes.)
(From a few moments Googling–& a bit of memory.)
And let's not forget Trudy, Queen of All Things Hat.
Hullaballoo, the book is excellent on the concerns of women of color, how there were schisms in the women's movement because of the way white women's concerns predominated, the impact of white women AND women of color on the civil rights movement, and so on. Collins is really good about never saying 'women" when she means "white middle class women."
LOL, Roberta. Queen of All Things Hat. Of course! Trudy's hats have always been fantastic! Now, Jane's hats, on the other hand…
I'm surprised that Joan doesn't seem to wear hats, although with Betty, she has the Euro/model thing, so maybe shes too sophisticated for them?
It's definitely a generational/financial thing.
I know that this is a discussion about public education, and that Catholic education (hell, Catholic ANYTHING) remains a thing apart.
But as late as the mid-80's, when I attended a Catholic high school in the L.A. suburbs, young women had to wear skirts. "Skirts and hose," actually, was what the dress code said. (Yes, really.)
I remember having one week — and I mean ONE, in all four years — when we girls could "buy" the right to wear jeans for a week, by raising money. That was my senior year. It was such an overwhelming success, the faculty had a series of meetings about how to "contain the behavior" (this would be female jeans-wearing). And spend the money, of course.
Those people were truly all about their thirty pieces of silver.
You might wonder why I remember minutiae like this so well. I doubt anyone at my high school was as well acquainted with the dress code as I was — having broken the thing so many, many times.
I loved this book. Deborah, thanks for teeing it up for others to enjoy!
The anecdotes make history come alive – and I think Gail Collins is a MM fan. Lots of love given to '60-'63 in her narrative, deservedly so.
Reading this book, and this thread full of instant memory joggers (thanks Freelancewoman for helping me relive junior high! and to AnneB for the usual poignant excellence), is a great reminder of just how far we've come, but also how much of that progress is easy to take for granted. Collins does us all an important service by introducing so many unsung heroes beyond the Steinem/Friedan stereotypes – Martha Griffiths is my new role model.
Basketcases, do buy or borrow WEC as soon as you can – you won't regret it!
And on another note, if you did not see Claire Danes absolutely knock it out of the park playing Temple Grandin this past Saturday on HBO, try and catch a repeat showing. You will not often see a more mesmerizing performance (OK, by someone other than Jon Hamm
). Here is another woman coming of age in the 60's and 70's who made a landmark impact on her industry because of, and in spite of, her autism. A fascinating story which includes the always-great David Straithairn in a supporting role.
"Can you imagine college classes with no jeans?"
Being a slightly more recent college graduate (class of '02), I've seen the transition toward college classes with no jeans. All of the Damn Kids Today (TM) are wearing their pajama pants to class.
In all seriousness, though, I'm very glad that I grew up in the era after such foolishness was removed from public school dress codes. My mother loved to tell me the tales of trudging to school in the cold New Hampshire winters wearing skirts and dresses, and the triumph of finally being allowed to wear slacks (no "dungarees"!) in high school. When I was a kid, I would've given my classmates quite a show hanging upside down from the monkey bars if I couldn't wear pants. And nothing was keeping me off the monkey bars.
I don't think it's apocryphal but I do remember reading about an actress who, denied seating at a posh restaurant in the early 70s because she was wearing a pants suit, stepped into the ladies room, removed the trousers and left them with the coat check, and blithely blew past the slack-jawed maitre 'd wearing the (long enough) jacket and heels to her table.
It was definitely another world, folks. I remember it well.
When my brother got married in ’69, his very mod bride wore a white lace pantsuit (it was appropriately bridal-looking). I can still remember the whispered shock and disbelief of the guests as she walked down the aisle!