"'Of women, by women, and for women': the day nursery movement in the Progressive-era United States".

Anne Durst, "'Of Women, By Women, and For Women': The Day Nursery Movement in the Progressive-era United States"

Wage-earning mothers of the Progressive-era United States shared a very pressing concern: securing care for their young children during their working hours. While many relied upon relatives or friends, others turned to day nurseries, institutions created by reform-minded women to address changing family needs in the industrial cities of the United States. National in scope, with particular focus on several municipal day nursery associations and individual nurseries, this study investigates how these early day care centers were shaped by the women whose lives intersected there: the managers who founded the nurseries, the matrons hired to run them, and the mothers who sought their services. Women at various levels of the day nursery movement approached this reform work from different perspectives, as some of the local managers and matrons fashioned policies that responded to the needs of actual wage-earning mothers rather than the dictates of the national day nursery and charity establishments And wage-earning mothers, despite the vulnerability that came with their precarious economic situations, sometimes found ways to assert their rights as parents and their aspirations for their families.