Walter B. Pitkin (1878–1953)

I had expected to this to be more in the Prosperity Gospel line of work but it was rather different. The rampant sexism and classism made it hard to see what he was talking about and I don't really think I do know what he was driving at most of the time. The chapter on how life will be in 1975 (this was written in 1932) has the same ring of any other prediction works. We didn't seem to get to low population county cities with houses with a garden where we grow food and return farms to forest or have food and fuel cost almost nothing. The chapter on women over forty is best left unmentioned. There are passing references to the Depression, no hint of the coming World War and certainly very little understanding of how most live. I tried to read up a bit on the book, it was very influential in its time, but it does not seem to have stood the test of time very well. I'm still trying to decide if it was terribly offensive or utter dreck or some combination of the two.… (meer)

5116. Life Begins At Forty, by Walter B. Pitkin (read 28 Jan 2014) This is a book published in 1934. The author was born 6 Feb 1878 in Ypsilanti, Michigan, and died 25 Jan 1953 in Palo Alto, Cal. He makes many sweeping statements with the air of one who sees the future unerringly. Some of what he says makes sense, e.g., that people after forty may be better equipped for making decisions, etc., but a lot of his predictions are way off: e.g., that the population of the U.S. would peak at about 175,000,000 in 1975 and thereafter decline. He considers the high schools and colleges of 1932 as doing a very poor job at educating, and accurately says many kids going to college are wasting their time--which is certainly even more true today, when college is often just another four years for kids to have fun and live off their parents.… (meer)