Prior to the 1960s.

An ever-increasing number of women had entered the workforce since the 1870s, but over a 120-year period, the identity of the woman worker changed. From the 1820s, with the onset of industrialization in the United States, until 1940, the average female employee was young and single, and, if married, the woman working outside the home was likely poor and African-American. From the 1940s to the 1970s, however, married women became the largest component of the female labor force, and the number of gainfully employed, white middle-class women rose rapidly.

Domesticity of the 1950s.

World War II had served as a catalyst encouraging women to take up the jobs vacated by their brothers, fathers, husbands, or sons who were off fighting the war. When the conflict ended, however, many women remained working outside the home. By 1960 over one-third of women were...