Reproductive Choice in the early 1960s - A Cautionary Tale

[MineralMan]

My high school years were between 1959 and 1963. Looking back, one of the things I remember was massive anxiety among my peers about sex. And no wonder. In my small citrus-growing town in Southern California, contraception was virtually unavailable. Condoms had to be purchased from the pharmacist behind the counter, and he was prohibited from selling them to anyone under the age of 21. Every package had a label that read, "For The Prevention of Disease Only!" The birth control pill was still a few years in the future.

What to do? Well, some kids abstained from sex. Other kids did "everything but." And yet, in my class of just over 100 kids, I know of about ten pregnancies during four years of high school. Nature will have its way. What happened to girls who found themselves with child unexpectedly? Some went to live with their aunt somewhere else. Some got married. Some were shamed into leaving school forever. But some, a few, had abortions.

How? Abortion was hugely illegal in California at that time. Here's how: There was one doctor in that small town who actually did abortions. It was a secret, but not too well-kept. If you were a girl whose family was well-connected and part of the higher level of social acceptance in that little town, you could have a quiet D&C in that doctor's office. If you were part of the third of the city that was Hispanic or in a lower income category, that option was not available, however.

Thank goodness we now have reproductive choice available. But, it's threatened, and seriously so. We need to be very watchful for attempts to take us back to the 50s and 60s. There's great pressure to do that coming from the right and the fundamentally religious in this country. We need to pay close attention and make sure we don't return to those days again of no reproductive choice at all for adolescents especially. I grew up without access to reproductive choice. I don't want to see anyone else in that situation ever again.

[athena]

1. Thank you for this post.

Just one thing to add: in many places in the U.S. today, abortion is not easily available. The National Network of Abortion Funds (NNAF) is one organization that provides women who need abortions with the funds to travel to a place where they can get an abortion. It's a very worthy cause.

[MineralMan]

2. I know, and it's getting worse every year.

Poor people and people of color are more seriously affected by it, too, just as they were back in the days I mentioned. I fear that things are beginning to revert to those old days. We need to stop that from happening, I think.

[world wide wally]

3. As long as people having sex, there will be abortions.

The idea behind making abortion legal was first and foremost making them safe for our women. A truly civilized concept if you give it more than a minute's thought. Republicans don't give a shit about an unborn fetus (or a born baby) but it makes for good, self-righteous politics in the south and Midwest. Until it happens to them.

[Arkansas Granny]

4. I grew up in that same era.

Several of the girls that I went to high school with either left school or got married, some as young as 15, due to becoming pregnant. Even after the pill was made available, it was only prescribed for married women.

I don’t know how many of my classmates had abortions. I know that at least one of them paid a visit to an old woman that lived in our rural community who performed that service. Luckily, she survived.

Women have fought too hard for too long to gain the reproductive rights that we have now. Going backward on this issue is not acceptable.

[MineralMan]

6. I didn't mention non-medical abortions.

I suppose those happened, too, in my small town. I wasn't aware of them at the time.

One thing I forgot to include: That same doctor also prescribed diaphragms for teens in the same group that could obtain abortions from him. He got around the prohibition against diaphragm prescriptions for unmarried women by prescribing for the girl's mother.

Some boys also got condoms through older friends. But you could absolutely not get them yourself. The town pharmacist simply wouldn't sell them to you. Besides, everyone knew who you were. The town was that small.

It was not a great situation to be in. My serious girlfriend and I were an "everything but" couple.

We MUST NOT allow things to slip backward.

[smirkymonkey]

5. K&R

[mopinko]

7. you are a little older than i, but

it was still pretty much the same in my era.
they were legal in wis at the time, so there was a bus every saturday that took girls up to wis, and brought them back the same day. hopefully you didnt need any after care.
one friend was bleeding heavily after she got back, and had no real choice but to ride it out. thankfully it stopped after a week. a week.

there was also an ob-gyn who would do them, but he was a couple hundred bucks more expensive than the bus ride.

and then there was jane.

yeah, no, not goin back.

[niyad]

8. thank you for this very thoughtful post.

[MineralMan]

11. You're more than welcome.

I just thought I'd bring up a subject that hasn't been discussed much. With Republicans in charge of the entire federal government, there's a great deal of risk involving this topic right now and it will continue as long as that is the situation.

I imagine that most of the people here are young enough not to remember when even contraception was illegal for unmarried people under the age of 21. I think it's important to remind everyone that many of us remember that time, and dealt with those realities when we were young folks.

I'm sure our parents back then had no idea of the conversations that their kids were having on the subject. They'd probably have been shocked, even though they may have had some of the same conversations when they were the same age. I clearly remember when the pill became available while I was in college. The student health center was extremely busy for some time after that and wrote literally thousands of prescriptions for it. Even before then, it had a big glass fish bowl full of condoms in the waiting area. I suppose that would have shocked parents, too.

But, in high school, it was up to us kids to work out how to handle such things. Some of us managed to avoid being pregnant or causing a pregnancy. Most of us had little or no education about sexuality. I was fortunate in having access to books on the subject in my parents' house. My mother had trained as a nurse and her texts were in the bookshelves. She knew I had read them and skipped the sex talk, although I think she had such a talk with my sister. But we were exceptions, really.

No information. No contraception. It was a recipe for disaster, and for many, that disaster actually happened, typically through ignorance. I had a steady girlfriend through most of high school. At some point, we had a long discussion about all of that. Both of us were bright kids and straight-A students. So, we just talked through a strategy for avoiding the problem without avoiding such an interesting thing to explore. It worked out fine for us, because we understood the risks and how to avoid them.

[niyad]

13. I am just a couple of years younger than you, and I remember those days well. I remember

several young women in my classes, one of who denied she was pregnant, as we watched her expanding daily. I told one of the teachers that we had it all figured out who would take her to the hospital when necessary.

even then, I questioned why the males never suffered any of the consequences, just went on their merry way. Roe was a true blessing, right along with the Pill.

[MineralMan]

14. I was brought up to be responsible for my actions.

Had I caused a pregnancy, there's no question about what I'd have done. I'd have married the girl I was with at the time. It probably would have been fine, but it certainly would have altered the course of both of our lives drastically. That was part of the discussion we had, actually, in that relationship. Both the girl and I had plans for our lives, and those plans didn't involve a baby. As it turned out, we went in different directions, as so often happens.

Fifty years later, we chatted at a high school reunion for a while, after all those years. Both of us were quite happy with how our lives had turned out, and we had a laugh at how deadly serious we were about things as teens. But, no regrets about any of it.

[niyad]

15. clearly, you were a very thoughtful and aware young man. there are many who are not.

[MineralMan]

16. Exactly, which is why access to contraception, abortion

and information about sexuality is so crucial. Yes, I was careful and thoughtful, as well as being mindful of consequences. It's so easy not to be, though, at that age. Contraception is protection against foolishness in many cases. Education can help prevent people from being foolish. And access to abortion can provide additional protection against life-changing eventualities.

It's difficult for me to understand how anyone could object to providing those things. It simply makes no sense. And yet, the objections are real and powerful. We need to do whatever we can to keep those things available to every new group of kids who come of age. So much depends on that.

[niyad]

18. it is all about, always, keeping control of females, keeping them second class, without

options. punishing WOMEN for being sexual (and praising the males, in many cases)

[MineralMan]

19. It is, isn't it?

How stupid we humans are, really.

[hamsterjill]

9. Appreciate your attention to this MOST IMPORTANT topic.

I'm a little younger than you, but growing up in a small town in Texas where everyone knows everyone else's business, my high school years were no different. Roe v. Wade was legal by the time I graduated, but that didn't mean it was accessible in small town America.

I believe in a woman's right to control her own body. I saw women either go through with an unwanted pregnancy and suffer consequences (i.e., marrying the father when that wasn't the right thing to do, suffering the stigma of everyone looking down on her, etc.). I also saw women seek out an abortion from someone or some thing less than medically safe to avoid being found out even after Roe v. Wade was legal.

Abortion should be private, safe and legal. I will not ever support a political candidate that does not understand this basic, human right.

Roe v. Wade is established law and we must protect it as we protect all other personal freedoms.

[MineralMan]

17. Exactly. We must safeguard every generation from being

enslaved by things that can be avoided. In an ideal world, education and free access to contraception would eliminate the need for most abortions, but that ideal world has never existed. Roe v. Wade is the backstop of reproductive choice. We must not remove it.

[no_hypocrisy]

10. It's so much more than abortion. It's contraception. It's locking women back into the home.

It's taking away the ability for women to engage in guilt-free and safe sex and their sexuality. It's changing society by regression.

[MineralMan]

12. Exactly. The religious right wants to simply suppress the

whole thing. That trick won't work, and has never worked. It can't work. There's that pesky fact that we are still mammals and hit puberty long before we're ready to assume adult roles. Even as adults, many of us want to avoid permanent, long-term relationships like marriage for many reasons.

We have to stick to our guns on reproductive freedom of choice.

[niyad]

20. "if we don't teach our teenagers about sex, they won't do it" --beverly lehaye (concerned women

for america, and wife of tim lehaye, co-author of that awful "left behind" series&quot she actually said this on national television. the entire audience burst into laughter.

it was on an afternoon talk show (phil donahue, I think). the host just looked at her, mouth agape, and said, "you cannot possibly believe that". she insisted that she did.

[MineralMan]

21. What a ridiculous thing to say! No wonder they laughed.

Most likely, Beverly, like most people, spent a small part of her teen years in the backseat of a car, fooling around with a boy. How people can forget the realities of being a mammal I will never understand.

[CousinIT]

22. They want to send women back further than that...

...

https://www.democraticunderground.com/10029034903

[maddiemom]

23. Same exact high school years as mine.

I well remember what it was like for girls at that time. A friend In college who "went to visit her aunt" while at our "rival" high school still got some smirks and remarks from guys from her old high school, but had a "good reputation" in college. She came out fine: a happy marriage (last I heard) with a man from elsewhere and AND a very successful career, not necessarily in that order of importance.

[countryjake]

24. "The Pill" Loretta Lynn's banned song

And this one was a prelude to that one...

[MineralMan]

25. It did change women's lives, for sure.