Etiquette Advice to Wives of 1938

Etiquette for a Wise Wife

WHAT is etiquette? How can a girl improve her manners and become a more likable social creature? Those questions come to me in almost every mail. I think a new book has all the answers.

Margaret Fishback combines rare good judgment and a sense of humor in her “Safe Conduct.” She speaks of etiquette in modern terms.

“In etiquette there is certainly no last word. no supreme authority on any subject,” she writes. “Etiquette is, rather, the behavior of the majority in any given age or place, plus a fundamental civilized desire to please.”

Miss Fishback pokes fun at some of the “ladylike” books of etiquette that teach snobbery instead of simple good manners. And she also gives some brutally honest advice to wives who hate to see their hard-working husbands take a night off now and then to be with “the boys.”

This section expresses my own feelings so well, that I quote from it, urging all loving and sometimes misguided wives to listen attentively.

“One of the things that frighten so much good masculine material out of the fold of matrimony is the sight of a once-free spirit whose wife has him under her thumb. There are many wives-loving, affectionate ones too- who have a particular aversion to seeing their husbands enjoy any good time without them.

“It isn't a matter of good times involving other women. What these wives resent is the innocent masculine evening, when the boys just want to get together and drink too much and push one another around and play poker and sing raucously and tell boarding-school jokes.

“A wife should try to be sympathetic toward this valiant effort of man to regain his lost youth. She should let him have his fling every little while, if he wants to, instead of smiling the martyred I'll-be-all-right-tomorrow smile, with the terribly, terribly hurt look in her eye that means she is grieved to find he should ever want to spend an evening away from his loving wife and the family hearth.

“The wife who puts on that kind of act is likely to become one of those I-never-have- any-fun women, who are such hair shirts to the masculine sex. Most of this species have nice homes, and books to read, and friends to play with, while Pop is out bread-winning. Yet they complain of their hard lot, which is bad marital strategy, because at first it bewilders a man, then the injustice of it irritates him, and that's when the bickering begins.

“So, after you snare your man, remember the girls who are still on the town, and don't frighten the surviving eligible males. If, after wedlock, a man may still call his soul just half his own, the other half will be dedicated with his compliments to the wife who continues to be as starry-eyed when her Benedict appears at the end of a hard day at the office, as she was during courtship.

“The perfect woman is the one who doesn't nag, or play the martyr, or deliberately incite jealousy, or display a jealous heart.” –San Bernardino Sun, 1938

🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia

Etiquette in One's Home

"If husbands and wives, generally, would render each other half of the little attentions they lavished upon each other before marriage, their mutual happiness would be more than doubled. A man has no right whatever to open his wife’s mail, but a woman should not receive any letters that she would not be willing that her husband should see."  — We at Etiquipedia would like to add, "And vice-versa."

DOMESTIC ETIQUETTE AND DUTIES

Etiquette is a comprehensive term, and its observances are nowhere more to be desired than in the domestic circle.

If husbands and wives, generally, would render each other half of the little attentions they lavished upon each other before marriage, their mutual happiness would be more than doubled.

A wife should never let her husband have cause to complain that she is more agreeable abroad than at home, nor see her negligent of dress and manners at home when it is the reverse in company.

If, unhappily, any misunderstandings or annoyances occur between husband and wife, it is ill-bred and unjust for either to repeat them to a third person.

Faithful unto death in all things should be the motto of both husband and wife; and forbearance with each other’s peculiarities, their never-ending effort to attain.

If a girl discovers very soon after her marriage that she has made a mistake, it is wisest for her to make the best of it; she should look for all that is good in her husband and try to forget that which she dislikes. There are times when a legal separation is necessary, but when people marry they marry for better or for worse, and if, unfortunately, it should be for worse, even that does not release them from the solemn vows which they have taken.

It is not in good taste for a husband and wife to call each other by endearing names in the presence of others.

A man has no right whatever to open his wife’s mail, but a woman should not receive any letters that she would not be willing that her husband should see. — From 1899's, Practical Etiquette 

Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J. Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia© Etiquette Encyclopedia 

Bad Manners Caused Divorce

So Gigi's aunt was correct?
“Bad table manners, my dear Gigi, have broken up more households than infidelity.” ~ Aunt Alicia instructing Gigi in proper dining etiquette.

Base of Divorce is Lack of Etiquette 

Mental cruelty caused by table manners, free and unrestrained, and a habit of calling names not recognized in books on etiquette, constituted the grounds on which an interlocutory decree of divorce was granted in Judge Shields' court yesterday to Mrs. Marie F. Crawshaw from John V. Crawshaw. 

Mrs. Crawshaw informed the court that her husband made various noises at table while engaged in gustatory exercises that were not exactly tolerated among the socially elect, in addition to a directness in the manner of addressing her that was not agreeable. 

Their two minor children were given to the mother, and defendant was ordered to pay $30.00 per month for their support. Crawshaw is a yardman in the employ of the Shell Oil company. The family home is in North Sacramento. — Sacramento Daily Union, 1919

🍽Etiquette Enthusiast, Maura J Graber, is the Site Editor for the Etiquipedia©Etiquette Encyclopedia