Attitudes and Traditions Regarding Courtship in the Golden Era

[Miss Moonlight]

This seems like the best place to ask a question about attitudes and traditions regarding courtship in the Golden Era. I saw the thread entitled, Changes in Attitude in Marriage & Divorce from the Golden Era to Now. But it didn't seem to really address this part of that subject, and it's such an old thread I didn't want to resurrect it.

Regarding courtship- or, to put it another way, the length of time people get to know each other before getting engaged, and then married- I am wondering if anyone knows if there were known traditions, or recommendations or an average, or if it was really quite particular to the couple.

I realize there are some variables- certain religions, certain cultures, might have had rules of their own. But I'm thinking of the average, American man and woman in the Golden Era. I'm also sure there were things that occurred during WW2 that might not have otherwise, such as getting married because a man was going off to an uncertain fate.

If you look at today's articles, advice, etc., most people think time is the biggest deal. As if time is all we need to guarantee it will work- that couples should be dating for at least a year and then engaged another year at least. All the usual reasons are given about stability and being certain you know the person so well, but none of that seems to have helped the divorce rate. Heck, I was with someone over a year and then got engaged and he basically turned into someone else shortly thereafter- a very bad someone else.

I can't really buy the notion that everyone in the recent past did things the way modern advice givers would them to. Or that this difference really made a huge difference in their happiness.

So can anyone shed some light on the subject.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Regarding courtship- or, to put it another way, the length of time people get to know each other before getting engaged, and then married- I am wondering if anyone knows if there were known traditions, or recommendations or an average, or if it was really quite particular to the couple.

Speaking very generally, it wasn't uncommon for a couple to be engaged for several years during the Depression era -- the idea being that marriage needed to wait until it was possible for the couple to be self-supporting. Some young couples did live with in-laws for a while after marriage -- usually the bride's parents -- but this was often the result of a "had to get married" situation rather than a deliberate choice. Overall, the marriage rate in the early 1930s was the lowest it had been in decades.

The war era, by contrast, showed a sharp increase in "impulse marriages," couples getting married on the spur of the moment or after a very short courtship due to the circumstances of the moment. This marry-in-haste-repent-at-leisure approach led to a sharp increase in the divorce rate in the years immediately after the war -- a lot of couples who married in 1942 and never spent much time together until 1946 realized that whatever had brought them together in the first place had evaporated and wasn't coming back.

 

[Guttersnipe]

As alway, LizzieMaine does a good job of pointing to the major social trends of the matter. One more thing I'd point out that, while divorce rates are higher today, that does not mean marriages were any happier in the Era, per se (a survey of literature from the period, both from high culture and low vulgar, shows that the theme of being trapped in unhappy matrimony was an all too common subject). The economic realites of the day (i.e., single-income households, with male breadwinners) meant that divorce was something most could not afford.

 

[LizzieMaine]

As alway, LizzieMaine does a good job of pointing to the major social trends of the matter. One more thing I'd point out that, while divorce rates are higher today, that does not mean marriages were any happier in the Era, per se (a survey of literature from the period, both from high culture and low vulgar, shows that the theme of being trapped in unhappy matrimony was an all too common subject). The economic realites of the day (i.e., single-income households, with male breadwinners) meant that divorce was something most could not afford.

Desertion was extremely common in working-class families -- the husband would just pick up and leave and the wife and kids would never hear from him again, even though the marriage wasn't officially dissolved. Occasionally, it would be the wife. And sometimes both the parents would just disappear, leaving the older kids to take care of the young.

A lot of the old ladies who ran boardinghouses in the Era were women who'd been deserted by their husbands and resorted to taking in roomers for an income.

 

[Foxer55]

Lizzie,

Speaking very generally, it wasn't uncommon for a couple to be engaged for several years during the Depression era -- the idea being that marriage needed to wait until it was possible for the couple to be self-supporting. Some young couples did live with in-laws for a while after marriage -- usually the bride's parents -- but this was often the result of a "had to get married" situation rather than a deliberate choice. Overall, the marriage rate in the early 1930s was the lowest it had been in decades.

The war era, by contrast, showed a sharp increase in "impulse marriages," couples getting married on the spur of the moment or after a very short courtship due to the circumstances of the moment. This marry-in-haste-repent-at-leisure approach led to a sharp increase in the divorce rate in the years immediately after the war -- a lot of couples who married in 1942 and never spent much time together until 1946 realized that whatever had brought them together in the first place had evaporated and wasn't coming back.

Yeah, but its amazing the number of marry-in-haste marriages at and during the war that did prevail. Can anyone imagine marrying someone you just met a few weeks ago and for that marriage to last a lifetime? Wow, that takes commitment.

 

[Miss Moonlight]

A lot of the old ladies who ran boardinghouses in the Era were women who'd been deserted by their husbands and resorted to taking in roomers for an income.

I think it's also something widows often turned to.

I can only imagine how hard the war was on couples who didn't know each other all that well- they might have had similar outlooks, but after teh war, so many men and women were changed.

Thank you for the input.

 

[Two Types]

Looking back through my family (both sets of grandparents/great-grandmother/a couple of aunts), there was a definite tradition: marry quickly before the baby is born.

Mind you, I doubt my great-grandmother would be a good example: she had her first two or three kids by various men (identities in doubt), then married and had some more kids, then deserted that family to marry my great-grandfather. I think she helped pioneer the modern way of doing things.