Ann Perkins Quotes

There is no greater right for a woman than having a choice, Anne. And I exercised that right. Fully and consciously.

I want you to know something. Of course I had opportunities at love. They didn’t work out, but I have not been entirely loveless. And yes, I took prophylactic precautions with a dedication that was more powerful than any maternal urge. These were my decisions. There is no greater right for a woman than having a choice, Anne. And I exercised that right. Fully and consciously.

(At the end of the nineteenth century, economist Charlotte Perkins Gilman complained that housework was the only job that had not been modernized.)

Goodness, thought Dawn. Aren’t two-year-olds supposed to be over that business of putting things in their mouths? Yes, they are, she told herself, realizing something: Emily was not like other two-year-olds she knew. She thought of Marnie Barrett and Gabbie Perkins, kids us club members sit for. Both Marnie and Gabbie, especially Gabbie, are talkers. (Gabbie’s a little older than Marnie.) Gabbie is toilet-trained and Marnie is working on it. Both girls can put simple puzzles together. When they color, their drawings are becoming identifiable. And Gabbie has memorized and can sing long songs with her older sister. Emily, on the other hand, was nowhere near toilet-trained. Her favorite toys were baby toys like stacking rings. When she got hold of crayons, she just scribbled. And her vocabulary consisted of a handful of words and a lot of sounds (such as “buh” or “da”) that she used to mean a variety of things. Yet, Emily was smiley and giggly and cheerful. She was affectionate, too, and tried hard to please her new family.

Becton Engineering and Applied Science Center,

Women needed to go further than just amending a few laws, Millett told the crowd before her. Attitudes, assumptions, systems, and power structures all needed to change. But there was hope. “We have 53 percent—the most powerful political force in the nation!” she declared.

Women were sort of the ornaments to the men, which was not my style,

Myriah and Gabbie jumped up from the table. "We know White Christmas," said Myriah. "And I'll Be Home for Christmas." Claudia was surprised. They did? What about the simple songs like "Jingle Bells" or "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer?" But the Perkins girls know a lot of long, grown-up songs, and sure enough they knew both of these word for word. They performed them with hand motions and everything.

Frank Hummert was a Chicago copywriter in the ’20s. In 1930 he met Anne Ashenhurst, a former newspaperwoman who became his assistant and, five years later, his wife. The Hummerts had a formula that was surefire: appeal to the lowest common denominator, make it clear, grab the heartstrings, and reap the rewards. With writer Robert Hardy Andrews they created The Stolen Husband, one of radio’s earliest soaps. Hummert went on to do the most notable serials of the daytime. His name was added to the agency Blackett & Sample, though he was never a partner and owned no part of it. He left Blackett-Sample-Hummert and moved to New York. His new company, Air Features, Inc., turned out (among many others) Just Plain Bill, The Romance of Helen Trent, Ma Perkins, Our Gal Sunday, Lorenzo Jones, and Stella Dallas. It was estimated that Hummert at his peak bought 12.5 percent of the entire network radio schedule, that he billed $12 million a year, that his fiction factory produced almost seven million words a season.

Just Plain Bill was one of the biggest (and first) successes of daytime radio, enjoying a run of more than two decades. It exploited a favored theme of producers Frank and Anne Hummert: life in a small town. The precise location of Hartville was not revealed, but it was always thought to be somewhere in the Midwest. The serial was unusual in at least two aspects: the protagonist was male, and the musical bridges were played on guitar and harmonica, giving it a sound quite unlike the organ-drenched serials around it. Bill Davidson was one of the first great philosophers of serial drama. He was the male counterpart of Ma Perkins, predating that staunch old mother of the air by almost a year. He ran a barbershop, but what Bill did best was meddle in the lives of his friends, all for their own good. He got involved under protest, arguing in that marvelously caring voice that “this is really none of my affair” while the announcer returned to put it in perspective: How can Bill, drawn into the middle of this romantic triangle, straighten out the lives of his friends?

Janelle smiled in a way that suggested that Stevie was a beautiful tropical fish, so simple and so precious.