As mentioned in CheckMate1, the pair of anonymous 1933-vintage brochures "Choosing a Husband" and "Choosing a Wife" contain some charming (and fun!) reading. The yellowed covers of the booklets claim to offer "A scientific method of ascertaining, before marriage, the possibility of success or failure of this important venture". I don't know about scientific, but at least the issues raised by the publisher ("Voice of Experience, Inc.") generally remain quite relevant.

From "Questionnaire No. 2", some of the questions for a young man to answer:

Emotional Qualifications

• Are you sure that her love for you is genuine?
• Is it possible that she is interested in marrying you to get away from ugly home conditions?
• Is she equally as interested in you for your companionship as for your love-making?
• Has she been properly instructed about the "facts of life"?
• Does she object to your being friendly toward other girls?
• Is she more at home on a dance floor than in a kitchen or a nursery?
• Is she endowed with a strong, instinctive mother-love?
• Are you jealous of her past friendships with men?
• Are you suspicious about her conduct with any former boy friend?

Social Adaptability

• Are you completely happy with her when in the company of others?
• Does she snicker or titter or show other objectionable mannerisms which would class as social liabilities?
• Would you be proud to present her to your mother?
• Is she snobbish or catty toward other women?
• Is she kind, friendly, sympathetic, cordial, sincere, truthful to the degree you think desirable?

Family Relations

• Is she a typical "Mamma's Angel Child"?
• Are you prepared to offer her a home separate and apart from either family of in-laws?
• In case of a little family squabble, is she the type that would pack her grip and run home to mother?

Domestic Interests

• Can she cook? If not, would she be willing to learn, and would you be a patient victim during the process?
• Is she ashamed to be seen with a needle and thread?
• Could you trust her with the budgeting of your household expenses?
• Is she Lazy?
• Does she allow mother to serve her breakfast in bed?

Physical Adaptability

• Does she hold a great physical attraction for you?
• Does she dress to suit your taste?
• If she now smokes, would you object to her smoking after marriage?
• Would she be willing to give up smoking if she found herself a prospective mother during the entire period of expectancy?
• Are you agreed about her use of cosmetics?
• Is she spic and span in public, but greasy and frowsy about her person behind the doors of her own home?
• Is she considerably taller than you, and if so, does it give you a sense of inferiority?

Mental Qualifications

• Is she "beautiful but dumb"?
• Is she a nag or a domineering woman?
• Is she excessively timid and self-conscious?
• Does she plead sick the minute things go wrong?
• Does she prefer the company of her girl friends to your company when you are not actually engaged in making love to her?
• Is she a chronic procrastinator, indecisive, doubting, suspicious, solitary, supersensitive, or inclined to be melancholy?
• Does she expect you to be the solution of all her past problems?
• Does she pout or sulk?
• Is she a natural born flirt?
• Did you meet her as the result of a flirtation?
• Is she an angel at church and a devil at home?
• Is she inclined to put on weight easily, and if so would you object to a fat wife?
• Does she show characteristics which would cause you to infer that after marriage you would not "wear the pants" in your household?
• Can she take a joke when the joke is directed toward her?

Leisure Pursuits

• Will she be jealous of any leisure activities which you may want to carry on by yourself?
• If business prevented your accompanying her to the opera or theatre, would you be willing to allow her to go with one of her or your male friends?

Religious and Racial

• Does she share with you ideas regarding the religious education of your children?
• Will the religious customs of her family interfere with your relations to her?

_{(See CheckMate1 for questions which a bride-to-be should ask herself about her intended. And note a severely dated riddle from a 1920's joke book: "Why do girls kiss other girls, but men don't kiss other men?" The answer: "Girls have nothing better to kiss, but men do!")}

TopicSociety - TopicHumor - 2001-11-30

(correlates: CheckMate1, NoProblem, MetaJoke, ...)