Helen Andelin

Absolutely.

You can kind of draw a connection between bestselling books written in the 1960s and 70s, like Mormon Helen Andelin's Fascinating Womanhood that promoted this view of femininity and particularly to Mormon women, but more broadly to conservative women, to Maribel Morgan's book, The Total Woman in the 1970s.

That book was the best-selling nonfiction book in the country in 1974, sold more than 10 million copies.

These are the books that helped shape this massive Christian publishing industry so that today, you know, you walk into a Christian bookstore, you pick up a book with pink flowers and Christian words on the cover.

And this was very much a counter-movement against feminism here, too.

Helen Andelin and Fascinating Womanhood published the same year as the Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan's book.

What was her shtick?

So the Fascinating Womanhood is a book about how to be a good Christian woman, how to be a good wife generally.

So just tell him good things about himself, and then you will get everything that you've always longed for.

That's the source of a happy marriage.

Now, Helen Andelin was actually Mormon.

And she's drawing a little bit on her Mormon faith to write this, but she's also drawing on a set of booklets also called Fascinating Womanhood that were published in 1922.

And this was very much a counter-movement against feminism here, too.

Helen Andelin and Fascinating Womanhood published the same year as the Feminine Mystique, Betty Friedan's book.

What was her shtick?

So the Fascinating Womanhood is a book about how to be a good Christian woman, how to be a good wife generally.

So just tell him good things about himself, and then you will get everything that you've always longed for.

That's the source of a happy marriage.

Now, Helen Andelin was actually Mormon.

And she's drawing a little bit on her Mormon faith to write this, but she's also drawing on a set of booklets also called Fascinating Womanhood that were published in 1922.