BETTY CROCKER: SIMULACRUM
In Finding Betty Crocker, Susan Marks explores the history and impact of America’s First Lady of Food. Through print, radio, and television, Betty Crocker shared advice about homemaking and cooking but by the 1950s she had devolved into an advertising gimmick for selling General Mills packaged mixes. Created for the sake of convenience, Betty reached women across the country thanks to the mass media. A rare female authority figure, her no-nonsense tone, solid advice, and empathy for her public made Betty a hit from the beginning. By responding to letters through the mail or over the radio, Betty Crocker delivered relevant information to women saddled with the chore of caring for their families. However, in the early 1950s, Betty’s message shifted from assistance to cheerleading for General Mills. Composed of many minds, bodies, and objectives, Betty’s fractured personality failed to deliver the empathy and relevant information her customers had previously enjoyed despite increases in media technology and the availability of packaged foods.
Betty Crocker is truly a fabricated entity, though her birthplace is clear enough. The child of Washburn Crosby, a milling company, her name came into being when employees of Washburn Crosby’s Home Service Department needed a consistent signature to use when responding to letters from customers. (Marks 11) Crocker was chosen in honor of a top executive, and Betty was declared to be homey and comforting. As the company expanded, Washburn Crosby’s home economists responded to ever-increasing numbers of letters from women with questions about successful baking. Isolated from their peers and facing new and unfamiliar kitchen gadgets, these women were charged with the almost spiritual duty of keeping their families happy and healthy, and desperately needed advice. (Marks 12)
Domestic experts were certainly not a novel advertising tactic when Betty Crocker burst onto the scene. Women’s magazines were full of opinions and testimonials, though advertisements and articles were at times indistinguishable as a host of women with matronly names and calming smiles endorsed a variety of products. (Marks 14) In order to stand out, Washburn Crosby executives developed the notion of “kitchen-testing” in hopes of attracting more customers for their Gold Medal Flour, sending out recipe booklets from the Gold Medal Kitchen—signed by Betty Crocker, of course. (Marks 19)
Part of Betty’s notoriety was due to traveling cooking demonstrations and official cooking schools, where educated home economists demonstrated cooking techniques and recipes based on Gold Medal Flour. (Marks 22) In keeping with the notion of the home as the default social unit, before industrialization women learned to cook from their relatives and handed down family recipes. However, these recipes were based on nonstandard measurements, varying pan sizes, and a wide array of ovens, so a biscuit recipe that worked in grandma’s wood-burning oven would have to be modified to get the same results from her granddaughter’s electric oven. As kitchen appliances evolved and became standardized, more and more women were left with boxes of obsolete recipes and the heavy responsibility of feeding their families. Rather than repeatedly testing each recipe to determine the proper proportions and temperatures, women turned to experts outside the home for assistance; however, professional home economists did not have to make do with outdated or dysfunctional appliances, and a tricked-out industrial home was necessary to make full use of their expertise. “Waffle irons, warming pads, cabinet electric ranges, toasters, and even a Grecian urn percolator were on offer to fill every available outlet.” (Marks 27) The prevailing message was that new tools had to be purchased if women wanted to cook well, and a wider array of choices had never before existed. Ironically, in order to produce nourishing food within the home, women were told to search for resources elsewhere.
Due to Betty’s success as a paper personality, her creators decided to take advantage of the growing numbers of radios in American homes and give Betty her own radio show. She started out on a small regional station in Minnesota in 1924, discussing everything from “cooking and ‘female concerns’” as well as “housekeeping and time management to husbands and beaux…and, of course, Gold Medal Flour.” Recipes and cooking techniques were her primary focus, as “the show extolled the virtues of a well-balanced, healthy meal and women’s obligation to serve it.” (Marks 31) One particularly brilliant creation was Betty Crocker’s Cooking School of the Air. Listeners were invited to enroll by mail and take lessons by listening to Betty’s radio shows. During the program’s twenty-seven years, over one million women and men participated officially. (Marks 35)
Betty certainly did not force women into the kitchen; rather, the prevailing 1920s social climate, stubbornly lauding Victorian gender roles, had already determined what women could properly do. As a rare female authority figure, Betty’s mission was to help women make sense of their duties and skillfully complete their domestic tasks. If industrial life consisted of a network of corporate families, Betty Crocker certainly served as a mother to people in need of guidance, offering advice for dealing with the everywoman’s daily hassles. Betty received letters from male and female listeners about food, family, and the content of her show, and she often responded to common concerns during her programs. (Marks 36) Though her primary purpose was peddling flour, on air Betty sympathized with the demands women faced, offering her services to ameliorate their concerns, and was loved because of it. Her friendly face brought immense amounts of goodwill to Washburn Crosby and, after a handful of smaller companies merged in 1928, General Mills as well.
As Betty gained popularity, her radio show was expanded from a single channel in Minnesota to twelve regional NBC stations across the country, and a version of Betty’s show could be heard on thirty stations by 1930. (Marks 49) Each show’s script was the same, but Betty was played by a different woman on each of the twelve channels. (Marks 37) Each Radio-Betty was an eerie copy of the other Radio-Betties, who attempted to duplicate a pre-packaged ideal. Marjorie Child Husted, director of the Gold Medal Flour Home Service Department, began crafting Betty’s personality and writing her radio scripts in 1927. (Marks 39) Husted was keenly aware of the potential impact radio could have on women’s lives. One of Betty’s shows addresses the marvelous opportunities provided by the radio.
“Not so many years ago we had to go out visiting with near neighbors, perhaps gossiping over the back fence, or we waited for a club meeting or sewing circle to exchange recipes. But now, though I am miles away, I can talk with you, and radio friends in Massachusetts can exchange ideas with those in California.” (Marks 41)
Home economist Christine Frederick also suggested that radio has been of great assistance to women in doing away with isolation, which “has been the cause of much of women’s restlessness and has done more to retard her progress than any other factor.” (Marks 49) Betty served her public by bringing news and information to women who felt limited within their own homes; through the convenience of instantaneous advice delivered on time, women could depend less on their peers and more on Betty. Again, women in an industrialized society take on the role of consumers, though in this case they consume knowledge distributed widely by an external authority rather than producing information within their own social groups or family units.
Emerging from Betty’s interaction with her public was “a growing fascination with love in relation to food.” (Marks 42) Women were concerned about finding husband-keeping recipes and feared competition from sneaky ladies with superior cooking skills; paranoia ran so deep that one listener wrote in to ask if her preference for white cake instead of Betty’s “husband-keeping” fudge cake meant her husband would be snagged by a neighbor. (Marks 42) In response to this widespread concern, Husted wrote specific shows pertaining to food and love. Interviews with bachelors and the long-running series “A Word to the Wives” strove illuminate the workings of the male mind and reveal exactly what qualities a man wanted in a woman. (Marks 67) The notion of women’s cooking expressing affection and exerting power over her subjects was firmly fixed in the mind of the public; no wonder advertisers have focused on it for nearly a century.
Through the medium of radio Betty offered aid and encouragement to many in times of widespread difficulty. During the Great Depression, over 30% of 47 million workers in the American labor force lost their jobs. As incomes fell across the country and budgeting became a monumental concern for families, many wrote to Betty about their woes. She responded, focusing programs on making do by creatively reworking leftovers, eating cheaper meat such as rabbit, and preparing nutritious meals on a low budget. (Marks 56) Rather than using the show as a vehicle for blatant promotion of General Mills products, Husted made sure to provide quality recipes and advice to the millions who suddenly found themselves in trouble so that Betty was seen as a friend first and Gold Medal Flour advocate second. No letter went unanswered, and though Betty’s legions might not have been purchasing General Mills products exclusively, both entities were on the receiving end of a great deal of goodwill.
Similarly, Betty was on hand during World War II to offer support in terms of culinary and emotional advice to millions of women who found themselves working outside the home and trying to cook for the family members who remained in the United States. The WWII era brought a new flush of importance to homemaking and enthusiastically returned affection on a national scale. As President Roosevelt said of American women in 1942, “The eyes of the nation are upon you. In far-flung outposts, in the military isolation camps near home, men at sea, men in tanks, men with guns, men in planes, look to you for strength.” (qtd. in Marks 87) Women found themselves guarding both their homes and the entire nation. Women were charged with keeping the country running in the absence of millions of men, which meant extra work both inside and outside the home; nearly half of all American women were employed at some time during the war. (Marks 93)
As rationing became increasingly restrictive, “ideas for how to feed families at home while conserving rations for troops were in high demand.” (Marks 87) Betty Crocker’s repertoire of recipes was altered again to fit available ingredients, first with a focus on replacing or forgoing sugar and later doing without fats and meats while cooks grew their own vegetables. (Marks 91) As during the Depression, Betty’s bold signature decorated General Mills booklets emphasizing thrift with respect to food and budgeting. The most notable was “Your Share: How to Prepare Appetizing, Healthful Meals with Foods Available Today,” which began with an earnest letter from Betty urging women to ensure they can say, “I worked for freedom today” by getting as much as they could out of available foods. (Marks 93)
As WWII wound down and women were expected to swap their paying jobs for the solitude of their kitchens, this recognition was urgently needed. The glorification of the homemaker escalated in 1944 with the Betty Crocker American Home Legion Program, designed to recognize women’s unpaid work within the home. 700,000 women registered, eager to receive recognition for “simple inglorious tasks” or necessary skills which make up daily life. (Marks 108)
So, that’s all for this week. Please do join me next week for the final instalment!