Welcome back, Frisco fans! You're tuning into Part Two and the conclusion of our deep dive into the San Francisco Examiner's 1944 sensation: "WOMEN IN SALOONS—The Shame of My Sex," by the legendary, if controversial, author Gertrude Atherton. If you missed the start, you definitely want to go back and listen to Part One! This episode picks up where we left off, following Atherton's increasingly frantic, first-hand reports as she descends from the glittering "Top of the Mark"—where she finds "all...attending strictly to business" in the gloom—down to the "second rate" clubs. She’s on a mission to document the moral "menacing breakdown of Feminine Morals in Our Brawling Barrooms." Things get louder, darker, and in her estimation, much uglier, with reports of "lewd" remarks and women "leaning heavily on the men" in crowded, raucous nightclubs.
Atherton, an 86-year-old self-proclaimed lifelong teetotaler, continues her survey of San Francisco's wartime nightlife, moving from the crowded dance halls to the more respectable cocktail bars frequented by women after a hard day's work. She actually offers a rare moment of nuance, distinguishing between the girls who are "out for the best that life has to offer" and the "frustrateds on the loose," seeking only an expensive fling. However, her true disdain is reserved for the affluent, blowsy women drinking from 11 AM to midnight in Marina bars, whose children wander in begging for dinner. This segment culminates in Atherton’s final, scathing assessment where she concludes that the majority of these "degraded women are fools—possibly morons" who lack the mental discipline to handle their newfound wartime "freedom" and turn into "human tanks."
The conclusion of Atherton's crusade isn't about mere disapproval—it's about a proposed societal cure. After rejecting prohibition as a remedy, she argues that these "fools are superfluous" and suggests they should be allowed to "drink themselves to death and the sooner the better," or else be "shut them up in institutions." Yikes. She then pivots to what she sees as the real problem: the children. Atherton makes a final, passionate appeal for saving this "new generation" by establishing large, comfortable country colonies with schools, proper care, and "personal affection" from "intelligent, motherly women." It’s a wild, shocking ride from a woman whose history includes links to eugenicist ideas and a clear sense of white supremacy. Join us for this final, unsettling look at a major San Francisco media event of 1944.
TRANSCRIPT
Welcome Frisco, the Secret History. I’m your host, Knox Bronson.
This is Part Two and the conclusion to our look at the San Francisco’s Examiner’s 1944 crusade against Barfly Women, Gertrude Atheron’s four-part series titled, “WOMEN IN SALOONS—The Shame of My Sex; A First Hand Report by a Noted Writer on Today's Riotous Indecencies and Menacing Breakdown of Feminine Morals in Our Brawling Barrooms.”
If you haven’t listened to Part One, I recommend that you do so before listening to this episode.
The first installment of Gertrude’s expose appeared in the Sunday Pages of the Examiner on November 12, 1944. Subsequent installment followed weekly. In this episode, we will cover the subsequent articles.
[intermezzo]
WOMEN IN SALOONS—The Shame of My Sex
More Revelations by a Distinguished Author About the Appalling Fall Of Uneasy Femininity From Grace in the Barrooms Of the Nation
By GERTRUDE ATHERTON
THE Golden Gate Bridge, the longest single span suspension bridge in the world, hideous by day, is a mile and three quarters of lights as round and brilliant as the lamps of Aladdin, as one sees it from "Top of the Mark," San Francisco's famous cocktail bar on the nineteenth floor of the Mark Hopkins Hotel. A troopship, bringing the wounded home from "Down Under," steams its sad way beneath it.
On the east side of the Bay, more lights not only of cities and towns but of the vast war industries that reach as far as the eye can travel.
Not far from the Mark is one of the skyscrapers that have destroyed the skyline of San Francisco, but a thing of beauty by night; it looked like a huge Christmas tree illuminated from foot to crown.
(This was 1944, thirty years before the building of the TransAmerica Pyramid, so I am not sure as to what structure she is referring. Remember that she was born in 1857 and was 33 years old before the first high-rise building was built in San Francisco, the Chronicle Building at 690 Market Street in 1890. It was 218 feet tall. I can only imagine what she would say about San Francisco’s hideous skyline today.)
Nevertheless, the guests drank slowly and steadily, the waiters darted about with glasses empty and full. The room was very dark and quiet. As I strolled about between the central bar and the tables I heard little conversation; all were attending strictly to business. As far as I could make out in the gloom the women were all young, but whether handsome or not it was impossible to determine. How they could hope to make themselves fascinating in a room so dark that even their makeup was invisible, and while maintaining the silence of robots, even my escort could not explain.
We went to another hotel, but here the crowd was so dense before the doors of both bar and [restaurant, the band and voices so raucous and both rooms so dark that I told my escort I had had enough of hotels and would like to go some place where there was more light and less noise. So we started on our descent from four-starred Class A to the second rate.
In the revealing light of the lobby their skins looked muddy, their waving locks rusty; their features were insignificant. But they were young, they were females, they were, it was to be presumed, entirely uninhibited, and acceptable to the men in lieu of something better. Many were chatting gaily, either with their escorts Or with disengaged males just before and behind them, but I noticed a group of four girls, as yet unattached, who looked somewhat anxious. They were all dressed in the prevailing fashion, but the lack of any bright colors made them look dingy; the men, especially those in uniform, made a better appearance.
WHAT STRUCK ME MOST FORCIBLY THAT EVENING WAS THE ENTIRE ABSENCE OF BEAUTY AMONG THE WOMEN: I DID NOT SEE ONE PRETTY FACE.
San Francisco has always been famous for its beautiful women, and wondered if these specimens were the flotsam that had drifted to the city after Pearl Harbor, when San Francisco became, almost overnight, one of the great ports and war industry centers of the Nation-or if our own sweet young things had been too faithful in their attendance at cocktail bars.
(And so they moved on to another nightclub.)
We entered a building not far away and took the elevator to the second floor. Sounds of revelry greeted us as we stepped out and when we entered an immense room the noise was deafening. At least 2,000 men and women were standing, ten deep, about a central stage where some kind of entertainment was going on, accomparied by a strident band. We walked slowly around the circle, looking in vain for an opening.
SOME OF THE WOMEN WERE LEANING HEAVILY ON THE MEN WHOSE ARMS SUPPORTED THEM WHEN THEY WERE ABLE TO STAND UP STRAIGHT THEMSELVES.
I overheard a number of remarks that can only be described by the good old word, "lewd."
My escort finally deposited me in a cubicle while he went in search of the proprietor whom I was to have the honor of meeting.
He was gone so long that I strolled up and down before adjacent booths, quite sure that I would attract no attention. Couples were drinking in several of them. It was late and heaven knows how many cocktails or straight bourbon--they had already consumed. I paid no attention to the men but observed the women closely. (This place was well lighted.) The face of one woman was crimson and puffed; her mouth drooled; her eyes watered. She was grinning foolishly at the man and I wondered if he would be sober enough to dodge her in the crowd and pick up something a trifle more appetizing.
Another a girl this time with lipstick smeared all over her face, was almost livid and looked as if about to be sick. Her hand and her mouth were trembling. I heard a shriek and hastened on. A man had his hand over a woman's mouth, and she was kicking and struggling, having arrived at the combative stage of inebriety. A big waiter darted forward and between them they hustled her out-no doubt leaving her on the sidewalk to be marched off by a policeman to spend the rest of the night in cell.
I had returned to my cubicle when my escort arrived with the proprietor-who was beaming.
"Pleased to meet you," he said. "Great sight, isn't it?"
I replied that it was and asked him what sort of entertainment it was that so roused the enthusiasm of the spectators--who were yelling lustily at the moment.
"Oh, juggling, tap dancing, naughty little plays, a song now and then, other kinds of dancing.”
I asked him if he had as large a crowd every night, and he assured me that he did: folks liked to be amused these days, and his liquor was as good as his show.
"Of course some drink too much and get rowdy and have to be put out, but that happens even in the big hotels, and what else could one expect?"
I congratulated him, and my escort having finished his bourbon, we thanked him and departed. In my next article I will tell my further adventures.
[intermezzo]
Before we enter into Part Two of Barfly Women, the shame of my sex, let us revisit the times and the author. Gertrude Atherton wrote the four-part series in 1944, the thick of World War II when she was 86 years old. She had been a teetotaler her whole life and claimed to have no judgments whatsoever about those who enjoyed alcohol, in moderation, anyway. She grew up in great wealth and extreme privilege, although I believe her long and successful writing a career was the result of her own talent and hard work. Yes, I’m sure her upbringing helped!
She was a white supremacist who thought that American civilization had been created by the "Nordic" and "Anglo-Saxon" races, and that this was now threatened by an influx of "Alpine" and "Mediterranean" immigrants. She was considered an early feminist from the 1800s on and while I cannot connect her directly to the Eugenics movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, there were strong ideological links between the suffragettes and the eugenicists, who believed they improve the world by inhibiting the fertility of those considered inferior, or promoting that of those considered superior.
Please keep this mind as we get to her final insights into the burgeoning phenomenon of Barfly Women and her suggestions for a cure to these societal ills as she perceived them.
Part 3
APPREHENSIVE newspapers are demanding a law prohibiting women from drinking in public bars.
(And here she quotes headlines from the papers)
"The race is threatened."
"Neglected children crowding juvenile courts."
"Women by the hundred thousand are sinking slowly into the bottomless pit of depravity."
"Criminal news and police blotters are heavily loaded with accounts of shameful brawls, indecent embroilments, jealous revenges, and worst of all--the now routine cases of abandoned children, broken homes and juvenile outrages."
Therefore, Congress (or the respective States) should pass a law making it illegal for women to drink in public places.
I do not believe this is the remedy; remember the dire results of prohibition. Even a supplementary law forbidding the sale of liquor to women would merely result in a revival of the old bootlegging industry. The baffled women, now craving drink as they never craved delicious food or even a candy jag, would drink themselves to death at home, and their children would probably starve to death.
Moreover, it would be an unjust law. The American women of today are legally the equals of men. If they are acceptable substitutes for men they should not be deprived of any of men's privileges.
NOR ARE THEY ALL AS DISSIPATED AS WOULD APPEAR ON THE SURFACE.
[intermezzo and Ravel’s Bolero]
Many of these women who frequent the more respectable cocktail bars, merely drop in for a drink or two at the end of a hard day's work (after the fashion of men who drink in moderation), pay no attention to the males present, braced and rested, go home to and, feeding both their children if they have any, or thankfully, after a hearty dinner, retire to bed with a book.
There are others, girls invariably, who, making more money than they will ever make again, and longing for an hour of gaiety after the long day's toil, some four or six in each group, meet at a cocktail bar at one of the great hotels where there is light and not too much noise.
They sit at a table by themselves and drink moderately, watching the brilliant scene, and although no pickups, hoping that some gallant male-or several will join them.
There is no vice in them, but this is their one chance to meet men of a class above their own, who, mayhap, will bring romance into their lives, followed by marriage in the good old tradition.
No doubt many satisfy this yearning, for they have gone home from work and put on their best clothes and a fresh make-up, they are animated and happy, and are out for the best that life has to offer. And these girls would put any man in his place if he misunderstood their new freedom.
But there is another class of young women, somewhat more mature, who might be called frustrateds on the loose.
There is no romance left in their disillusioned minds, nor do they club together. They frequent cocktail lounges solely in the hope of attracting some man who will pay for more drinks than they can afford-and possibly fur coat later on. They are not as brazen as the prostitutes, they come from respectable families and have good manners; they avoid brawls and men who look as if they might beat them up later, or perhaps murder them in some convenient alley.
Their manner is both frank and subtle, and they often get not only the fur coat but what they want even more-Life. Life after too many years of drab existence, plodding away at some dull job, or household chores, with never a fling, nor a chance for one until the Japs descended upon Pearl Harbor, Heaven bless the war, they exult.
That thousands of young men are being killed or maimed daily is no concern of theirs. It is doubtful if they ever listen to a war broadcast or open a newspaper. War is their deliverer, their fairy godfather who has taught them the pleasure that may be derived from bourbon or rum, the excitement, however brief, of the secret intrigue, the blessed knowledge that they are alive at least. Reprehensible females, no doubt, but pause for a moment and meditate upon those long years of frustration before sharpening your arrows.
Down on the Marina, a comparatively new section of our city and bordering on the Bay, there are many handsome houses of the wealthy, and others more modest but no less modern and tasteful. There is one long shopping street, as lively and varied as any "down town"; markets, restaurants and pet shops, also. Nothing is wanting to fill the needs of the little town.
And there are some four cocktail bars in every block.
In these bars, women whose husbands are making money, sit from 11 in the morning until midnight drinking and gossiping. The homes of these women are not on the Marina; they come from neighboring precincts where the occasional saloon is less to their taste. As the ladies of the Marina would scorn to be seen in a cocktail bar without their husbands or other family males attending to business in the daytime, these steady if rather blowsy customers are well served, unless they take too much, become rowdy and quarrelsome. Then they are thrown out.
Their children wander in on their way from school, begging Mom to come home and cook dinner, but are told to shift for themselves. How the children do make out is one of the mysteries, Perhaps charitable women in the neighborhood have established community kitchens, or The Children's Home Society has taken them on. But who can give sustenance to their bewildered minds? Their future may be one of the city's many problems.
But more of these women and their like in my article next Sunday.
And here we enter Part 4 of Gertrude’s final assessment and proposals for ridding society of the blight of the Barfly Woman.
WHAT is the fundamental reason for this sudden debasement of tens of thousands of heretofore respectable women; women who have descended to the level of swine since the war began; women who sit at bars all day or all night swilling whiskey or gin, staggering back to their neglected homes or falling down in the street and spending the night in jail? Women who are flung out of saloons brawling and kicking, making the night hideous with their yells?
Lonely? Millions of other women are lonely now that their husbands or lovers are away and in danger, but they occupy their time with their daily tasks, domestic or public. If they are obliged to support their families they hasten home after the day's work and look after the children, happy in the reunion. If comfortably off they give what time they can spare to the Red Cross and to clubs devoted to men in the service, correspond with homesick men in camp of at the front, take in a movie or read the new book. They take an intelligent interest in the war news, and in various other ways expand their minds instead of reducing their skull content to mush infested with maggots. They also keep their complexions.
It seems to me there is only one explanation.
These degraded women are fools--possibly morons.
They have always been fools, with just enough gray matter to keep them out of homes for the feebleminded. They absorbed the rudiments of education at the public schools the law obliged them to attend, and the common routine of life as they knew it kept them on the straight if somewhat dull and monotonous path of virtue until the sudden dislocations and what may be called the atmospheric hysteria of war sent them to cocktail bars and gin mills, at first for "a bit of fun"; then, lacking mental discipline, they surrendered to the love of liquor for its own sake. They have drowned every decent instinet and forgotten they are mothers; they have no love left in them for anything but drink and the sensual pleasure that liquor gives them.
A foreign correspondent once described the reaction of Sinclair Lewis to a scene in the streets of Gläsgow on a Saturday night. Women of the working class, reeling, yelling, fighting, lying about the streets, great lumps of sodden flesh, drooling, vomiting, comatose. Lewis was so overcome with horror that he flung his arms about wildly, screamed and cursed.
I don't wonder! As I have said before I am quite without bias, disliking spirits, owing to a youthful complex and uninterested in other people's morals and habits, but this widespread degradation of American women fills me with horror. Those women of Glasgow were of the lowest class, without education, and knew little of any of the decencies of life: their one escape from monotony, was the Saturday night debauch.
But our women have no such excuse. Before the war liquor meant nothing to them. They lived decent, temperate lives, attended to the wants of their husband and children, if not intelligently at least as a matter of inherited routine, gossiped with their neighbors and attended the nearest moving picture theater by ways of diversion.
Today they are human tanks with no intention or prospect of ever being anything else as long as their hearts and livers survive the strain. Their small children would starve but for charity, their older daughters frequent bars for young people and add to the problem of juvenile delinquency. These girls are not to be blamed, aside from the maternal example; they are merely silly little fools, smart alecs, who feel sophisticated and quite superior to the drones who stay at home and behave themselves.
The cure is simple enough. Impose a heavy fine upon all of these resorts that sell liquor to girls of their age, or close them altogether. There is always hope for youth. If these girls are rescued in time they will forget their passing folly and develop into decent womanhood, whether intelligent or not. Otherwise they will end either as prostitutes or sots.
As I have said, the women are fools and I hope I will not be denounced as heartless if I offer it as my considered opinion that fools are superfluous in this troubled world of ours and it would be a good idea to exterminate them. It is the legal right of these women to drink in public bars; let them drink themselves to death and the sooner the better. Or if they make loud nuisances of themselves shut them up in institutions. Some may be "redeemed" and return to their families sadder and wiser-or at least terrified into permanent sobriety.
What happens to the others does not matter. We have too many fools in the world, here is the opportunity to rid it of an ominous percentage. They belong to the dust heap. Sweep them out with a broom. Fools Are Greater Handicap To World Than Criminals
Fools are a greater handicap to civilization than criminals, who are more quickly spotted and disposed of. Fools are the tools of the unscrupulous with the gift of leadership. If there were fewer fools there would be no gangster dictatorships. The highest ideals of the democratic commonwealth would be fulfilled-perhaps. Well, all that is wishful thinking. Fools who observe the law and behave themselves in public are safe and will multiply in the land--and perhaps it is as well for, with no fools, there would be none of that smug sensation of superiority in the righteous, which would be bad for morale. However--the problem at present is what to do with-and for--the children. With these moronic degraded mothers removed, their unfortunate offspring would have a fair chance to escape not only their certainty of malnutrition and uncared for bodies generally, possibly beatings, but the demoralizing and lasting effects of an unhappy childhood. It is every child's right to be happy and carefree: Life is a troubled sojourn at best, and to start out on that long pilgrimage with a warped mind and a bitter sense of inferiority, fear, horror, disgust, and no happy light-hearted memories, is a barren soil for the ripening of a strong and confident maturity. And the poor old world worse off than ever, There is only one way to save this new generation-give it an equipment to fight for its share of human happiness and success, to meet life and conquer it. Large, comfortable homes, colonies of them where the need is greatest, should be built in the country, comfortable without luxury, with schools, playgrounds and gymnasia; where they would be fed scientifically, taught neatness and self-respect; above all, treated with personal affection by intelligent, motherly women. Teachers would study their individual bent and prepare them for life and how best to support themselves. Some of these children no doubt would be adopted by desirable couples, others reclaimed by fathers when the war was over although, with their wives dead, in jail, or prematurely old drunks reeling about the house, they| might be more than willing where they are. to leave their children But hurry up.
There is no time to lose.
[Intermezzo]
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