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Mothers of Conservatism

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Mothers of Conservatism tells the story of 1950s Southern Californian housewives who shaped the grassroots right in the two decades following World War II. Michelle Nickerson describes how red-hunt...
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"Nickerson has enriched conservative historiography by examining the integral... Read More
  • Format:
  • Publication Date: 07 September 2014
  • ISBN: 9780691163918
  • Pages: 264
  • Imprint: Princeton University Press

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Mothers of Conservatism tells the story of 1950s Southern Californian housewives who shaped the grassroots right in the two decades following World War II. Michelle Nickerson describes how red-hunting homemakers mobilized activist networks, institutions, and political consciousness in local education battles, and she introduces a generation of women who developed political styles and practices around their domestic routines. From the conservative movement's origins in the early fifties through the presidential election of 1964, Nickerson documents how women shaped conservatism from the bottom up, out of the fabric of their daily lives and into the agenda of the Republican Party.

A unique history of the American conservative movement, Mothers of Conservatism shows how housewives got out of the house and discovered their political capital.

"Nickerson has enriched conservative historiography by examining the integral role women played in conservatism's development and implementation and has forced feminist historiography to confront the complications that conservative female activists bring to the literature."---Mary C. Brennan, Journal of American History
Michelle M. Nickerson is associate professor of history at Loyola University, Chicago. She is coeditor of Sunbelt Rising: The Politics of Space, Place, and Region.