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Author Explores Lives of 'Practice Babies' Once Raised on College Campuses
Filed under: Adoption, Books for Parents, Celeb News & Interviews
This semester, we'll be studying art history, geology and baby-raising. Credit: Getty
From 1919 to 1969, infants -- called "practice babies" -- were delivered from orphanages to the home economics classrooms of U.S. colleges and universities, where young women were taught the science of mothering, NPR reports.
These "practice mothers" were taught Donna Reed-like domestic arts: cooking, cleaning, running a household and being a mom. According to NPR, the infants were essentially raised by teams of college coeds.
The campus approach to parenting served as the inspiration for author Lisa Grunwald's novel "The Irresistible Henry House," leading her to take a deeper look into what life was like for practice babies and their college-aged "moms."
ParentDish caught up with Grunwald, 50, mom to Elizabeth, 18, and Jonny, 13, via phone from her New York City apartment. An edited version of the interview follows.
ParentDish: How did you discover these "practice babies?"
Lisa Grunwald: I was working on an anthology of letters written by American women at the turn of the century. I was trying to study what life was like for mothers at the time, famous and not, and was seeking the secrets of women who aspired to be Betty Crocker. I expected to find letters about making good casseroles.
But I stumbled on the Corenell University website about home economics. There, I found this snapshot of the most beguiling baby with this roguish grin who had been a "practice baby." His name was Bobby Domecon and he had been cared for by about a dozen women who took turns being his "practice mom." Domecon, is short for "domestic economics." All of the babies at Cornell had the last name: Domecon. At Illinois State University, the babies all had the last name North or South.
PD: What inspired you to write the book, and why fiction?
LG: When I first read about this, I thought it was sort of weird and a little bit creepy. But I was gripped by Bobby's story and wanted to know more. So, I found out he'd arrived malnourished, very scrawny and not healthy, but that by the time he turned 4 months old in the "practice baby" setting, he was robust and obviously much healthier. I wanted to explore this further, but there was no real information on what happened to the babies after they were returned to the orphanages as toddlers and then were adopted. I had to make it fiction.
PD: What was the thinking behind colleges setting up "practice baby" programs?
LG: At the time in which this took place, everything was considered a possible opportunity for a scientific approach, and child care was no exception. The practice houses really embraced the idea that you could learn mothering the same way you learned cooking or learned chemistry -- everything was learnable, and systems were really important. I also discovered that many of the babies were in the orphanages because their families had fallen on hard times and couldn't care for their babies. The orphanages and colleges figured this was a better place for babies to be, to be cared by a team of "moms" and with all the scientific parenting practices in place -- a strict diet, regimented nap times, etc.
PD: How widespread was the "practice baby" phenomenon?
LG: I discovered that by the 1950s, there were 40 or 50 colleges and universities throughout the country who had this program in place, or something very similar. According to one 1952 estimate, there were 41 practice baby programs around the country, including ones at Eastern Illinois State, Oregon State University, Iowa State University, East Tennessee State University and Montana State University. At Cornell University for example, eight women students lived with a resident advisor in the "practice apartment."
PD: What where you looking to discover about these babies?
LG: There are all kinds of theories on parenting babies, from Doctor Spock to the idea of attachment disorder for babies who don't form a reliable attachment with one person, and I wanted to see how children developed without that. I found that these babies would have two or three "moms" within the course of a day, and 10 or more all told. They'd take turns being "the mother" so one might put the baby to sleep for a nap, and another would be the "mom" getting the baby out of the crib.
PD: Describe how the classes worked.
LG: At Cornell, "Practice, 126," was a required course for a Bachelor of Science in home economics. Half a dozen or more students worked rotating shifts of five weeks each, weighing and measuring, feeding and changing, taking the baby out for walks and losing sleep when he cried at night. The babies were supplied by child welfare groups and leased on contract by the universities before they were eventually returned to the orphanages and put up for adoption. The "moms" were very proud of their role and even kept scrapbooks of the baby's milestones.
PD: What has happened to the practice babies?
LG: Adoption records were hard to come by and there was no evidence, because the babies weren't followed and studied as they grew up. Just a couple weeks ago, I got my first call from a woman who said her mom was one of the practice moms, but I haven't had a chance to follow up yet. So, because I couldn't find out what happened to them, I figured it would be better to try to imagine what happened. It makes a much yummier novel.
PD: What discoveries did you make about parenting from studying the practice babies?
LG: When I first heard about this, I imagined I would discover a cautious tale about over-parenting or under-parenting, or something that would show me if I did right or wrong as a mom with my own two kids. I considered myself the opposite of a helicopter mom when they were little.
But I discovered that the theories on parenting are always changing. During the early part of the century, the thinking was that virtually anything could be improved by science, so, if transportation, communication and health could, why not motherhood? And there was no evidence that this was wrong, as most of the babies were returned to the orphanages physically healthier then when they arrived.
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ReaderComments (Page 5 of 5)
2-26-2011 @ 12:35AM
teddy knight said...In the early 1940s, the children of war workers were often treated in similar ways. It was a delightful experience, what I remember of it, and my younger brother and sister certainly had no problems being the center of attention from several high school or college students. Today, similar programs are used by Humane Societies to ready puppies for adoption, and fostering young animals or even older animals is considered a "best practice" by animal lovers. Humans are animals, after all, and the best way to raise a well-socialized animal is not to have it exclusively attached to one person, but to have it exposed, in a friendly way, to many different people of different ages and styles. We manufacture a lot of "neurotic" or "psychoaffective" disorders to say that people with different styles are "abnormal", but we seem to ignore that people with the many different backgrounds grow up totally normal. Since there is no evidence of any problems, maybe all those people who think there would have been real problems are just fantasizing.
Reply
2-25-2011 @ 10:59PM
LillieFaerie said...I graduated from nursing school in 76. For a while I worked at a hospital that was a teaching hospital for one of the universities. They had a child care center, beginning at 6 weeks of age and on. It was there so that people could 1. work and still be close to their kids enought to come and check on this at their lunches-available all three shifts, but they discouraged parents taking double shifts. 2. Students would come and observe what the children did from psych/psychology departments and probably med and nursing students They would do developmental tests at specific ages, but no medical tests. They had medical care if it was emergent. The price was cheap, my daughters went a couple of times-times when both of us had to work. We had no problem with it whatsoever. Later when we moved and the kids were in school, working at another university in another state, we learned that there is a school within that university where students go and are taught and observed there. Apparently that also was a big benefit to university employees-those that could get in as the enrollment was smaller, so that brings us through to the 90's I don't know if they still have that anymore. To my knowledge they weren't orphans, but employees kids at the first hospital and the second was the area kids but I imagine that the competition was greater to get in and it was well respected. I wouldn't doubt that schools within still exist.
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2-26-2011 @ 12:07PM
x said...sicknig!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!wtf!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Reply
2-26-2011 @ 2:34AM
Mary said...Back in southern Indiana when country high schools still had graduating classes of 25 students before consolidating them with the larger city school system, my aunts were allowed to bring their younger relatives that were toddlers to about 5 years of age to high school with them everyday for a week to practice parenting skills that they learned in home economics. We were their lab kids. The took us with them to classes, discussed how to take care of us, and got grades for it. I was 3 or 4 years old at the time, and those high school desks felt really big. Everyone said how cute I was. My aunt was so proud of me.
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2-26-2011 @ 2:37AM
Mary said...The country high school class with us took place in around 1959.
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2-26-2011 @ 3:09AM
krissy said...For Lisa Grunwald to say this type of "parenthood" for these orphans was "not wrong" is completely irresponsible. Lisa stated she knew that the "practice baby" program was "not wrong" because the babies were returned to the orphanage "physically healthier." But the fact that the babies were healthier, according to Lisa, does not shed light on the complete subject, I believe. I want to ask Lisa -- How do you know if these babies, taken from the orphanage and then returned back there months later, were returned psychologically, socially, mentally, or emotionally healthier? Were these "practice babies" scarred in any kind of a way by allowing our young people to "practice" with them on campus -- just passing them from girl to girl? Could they later in life have had problems with their psychological health?
How could it have been good for one of these "practice children" to have been passed from girl to girl, being in complete confusion, without being able to attach to any of them? And how could it have been good if he did become attached to one of the girls at the university, only to be returned to the orphanage? Up until this point there would have been no real stability in his life -- everything constantly changing. And what kind of problems would be presented if he went from an orphanage, to being with a bunch of college girls, to just one girl he was attached to, back to the orphange, on to a mom who adopted him and wanted to take good care of him? I imagine there would be many problems -- the most likely one being attachment problems to the new mom.
These assessments of attachment problems and deep confusion for the "practice babies" are not just my own thoughts -- I discussed this article with someone who has experienced adoption and knows about adoption issues. Those who have not been adopted, or who have not been close to someone who has, do not know the great struggles and issues adoptees go through -- some of which are: wanting to belong, curiosity and a deep longing at times (struggling to find out what happened in their life), relatives sometimes insisting on secrecy -- even not allowing them to know their own past, disappointment at finding no information on where birth relatives are or disappointing reunions when relatives are found, major trust issues -- who can you trust when your mother gave you away? (and the university too, for that matter?), problems attaching to anyone -- esp their mom, wondering who their "real mom" is (birthmom), wondering who they should call their "real mom" due to loyalties, etc. And perhaps for these "practice babies" they even remember their "university moms" even though their psyches were small, and miss them, and miss being ripped from them... Adoptees have a lot of healing to do even into adulthood sometimes, and I imagine "practice babies" even more so.
Ms. Grunwald, please don't say "there was no evidence that this was wrong" when speaking of the "practice baby" program. Babies are NOT to be experimented with or used for programs. Let's not be so quick to jump to do something like this ever again -- you can't play with the minds and lives of human beings.
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2-26-2011 @ 3:09AM
Porter said...What's better ? 1 woman to 10 babies or 10 mommies to one baby? The women were supervised and the babies felt nothing but constant attention and affection. It's better to be surrounded my many people providing great care than one overloaded overworked woman. The child always had someone there. It even says in the article that while the baby was in previous care before the university he lost 2 lbs before. Now he looks nice and healthy in the picture, no telling how many lives the University saved. And I read previously that these babies were "must haves" by the adoptive babies. Maybe the mothers did it for a grade but the babies got something out of it too. I know I would cringe at the thought of my son lying alone in some orphanage not having any sort of real one-on-one. It also says in the article that many women grew attached to the babies and kept albums....doesn't sound really cold to me.
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2-26-2011 @ 3:28AM
krissy knox said...@Porter What's better? I'd say one woman to 10 babies. Not 10 women to one baby. What more ressembles a real household? A real household usually consists of a mom and several children, not one child with 10 "faux moms." As I stated earlier, if a baby has 10 "moms" for awhile, and then is pulled away, he will later have attachment problems if he has attached to any of these girls from the university. He will then have trouble attaching to his new mom. This is a known fact. And I think you have proven my point by saying "that many women grew attached to the babies and kept albums." Now how could that have been good for the babies and the Moms? To grow attachments and then be yanked away? Is it cold, you ask? Well, yeah, sure sounds cold to me...
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2-27-2011 @ 1:56PM
barbara said...How utterly sad and sickening. Too bad the real mothers were not helped. Oh, but they were poor and/or unwed. Certainly not worthy of same assistance as college girls.