Book cover of From Front Porch to Back Seat: Courtship in Twentieth-Century America

Book description

"Whether or not we've come a long way since then, this engaging study of courtship shows that at least half the fun is in reading about getting there."--'St. Louis Post-Dispatch.'

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Why read it?

1 author picked From Front Porch to Back Seat as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

While we can hardly think about couples today without the idea of dating, the practice was new and very edgy in the early 20th century.

Beth Bailey shows how the classic “dating and rating” complex emerged and became not just accepted but expected among middle-class couples. She also takes us through the transition to the “going steady” complex later in the century.

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German pianist Hedda Schlagel's world collapsed when her fiancé, Fritz, vanished after being sent to an enemy alien camp in the United States during the Great War. Fifteen years later, in 1932, Hedda…

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