By Jim Heffernan
I ran across this title and was immediately intrigued by why a serious historian would write about wonder woman. Turns out it’s a good story about women’s progress in the first half of the 20th Century. It’s largely a biographical sketch of William Marston, and his lie detector, the lie detector and Wonder Woman. It’s also the story of a very different household. It is a well-written book with many illustrations. Even if you’re not a reader, I think that you would probably enjoy the book just for its pictures.
William met his wife, Sadie Holloway while they were pursuing psychology degrees, 1910-1914. He was at Harvard and she was at sister college, Mount Holyoke. They both earned psychology and law degrees.
They got different jobs during World War I and that’s when William met Marjorie W. Huntley. At the end of the war, they all moved back to Rye, New York and became a “threesome”. William had children with both women. In 1925, Marston met Olive Byrne while she was a student at Tufts University. She became his assistant and by 1927 she moved in with Marston, Sadie, and Marjorie. She also had a child with Marston. Olive was a niece to Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood.
The family in 1946. Left to right: Huntley, Byrne, O.A., Pete, Marston, Olive Byrne, Donn, and Holloway
Marston lost his credibility. He spent the last two decades of his life struggling with his lie detector, consulting with the movies, and pioneering the Wonder Woman comic. Elizabeth Holloway was the only source of dependable income for the household in this period.
Marston died of cancer in 1947. He really didn’t benefit commercially from his lie detector. Wonder Woman comics began in 1941 and are still sold today. Dorothy Holloway and Olive Byrne continued to live together until their deaths in the 1990’s.
Here are some excerpts I enjoyed.
“A matriarchy, Marston said, was inevitable. “Neglected Amazons to Rule Men in 1,000 Yrs., Says Psychologist,” the Washington Post reported. “Women have twice the emotional development, the ability for love, than man has,” Marston explained. “And as they develop as much ability for worldly success as they already have ability for love, they will clearly come to rule business and the Nation and the world.” There would be a new race of Amazons: in the psychological rather than the physical sense,”
“The next 100 years will see the beginning of an American matriarchy— “In 500 years, there will be a serious sex battle. And in 1,000 years women will definitely rule this country.”Pg.170 (Marston to Washington Post in 1935)
“In the end, the judge ruled that no woman has “the right to copulate with a feeling of security that there will be no resulting conception”: if a woman isn’t willing to die in childbirth, she shouldn’t have sex.” Pg. 96 1917 (this is what a judge said when Olive’s mother was sentenced to 30 days in jail for printing information about contraception.)
“Because I believe that deep down in woman’s nature lies slumbering the spirit of revolt. Because I believe that woman is enslaved by the world machine, by sex conventions, by motherhood and its present necessary child rearing, by wage-slavery, by middle-class morality, by customs, laws and superstitions. Because I believe that woman’s freedom depends upon awakening that spirit of revolt within her against these things which enslave her. Because I believe that these things which enslave woman must be fought openly, fearlessly, consciously. Pg. 88” 1914 (an introduction to Margaret Sanger’s 1914 publication, “A Woman Rebel”)
The book is available at Cloud and Leaf Bookstore, Manzanita and Tillamook County Library.
As always, discussion welcome at codger817@gmail.com