WHAT WOMEN WATCHED: Daytime Television in the 1950s

"Who is this new woman, and what is her place in postwar America?" asks Cassidy as she delves into the subject of the social and feminist consequences of television programming during the 1950s. The University of Illinois–Chicago professor has created a readable treatise on the evolution of daytime TV in an era when most women were expected to be in the home as their husbands continued their lives in the public sphere. Alone during the days, with TV as their connection to the outside world, women were targeted as burgeoning consumers and told what to clean with, what to feed their families and "to leave wartime plainness behind and to embrace glamour." Encouraged by various "charm boys" (game show hosts) to tune in, women looked on as their peers became Queen for a Day or hit the big time on Strike It Rich . Cassidy moves smoothly between portraits of hosts, game shows, other programs and their effects on women's personal and public personas. While her writing is fairly academic, she makes a strong case that daytime television was more than a cultural phenomenon and should be respected as an important part of women's history. Illus. (May)