Families in the 19th and early 20th centuries often had large families. What affect does birth order have personality? This is a question I considered while creating the Steward family in Angel of Mercy. Birth order and personality wasn’t something people considered until the 1920s. That’s when Austrian psychiatrist Alfred Adler first theorized that birth […]
Parenting Styles in the 1910s
Today, parenting styles tend to lean toward warm and nurturing. This style is a modern trend. For much of history, children lived hard lives, without much of a childhood. Childhood as we know it is a Victorian invention. A parent’s job is to prepare children for life as productive members of society. In the late […]
Family Size and Life Expectancy in 1910
The stereotype is that people who lived in the early 20th century were ignorant of how the reproductive system works, had large families, and died entering what we would now consider middle age. In reality, this view better represents the mid-19th century, when high infant mortality rates combined with farm families needing many workers. Let’s […]