American Radio in the Service of Woman

Linda Karam is one of our cultured young ladies. She now resides in New York, where she carries on various cultural activities, among them broadcasting on subjects connected with her observations there, especially the life of the American woman.

What are the subjects that please you, Madam, when you turn the knob of the radio to listen to the station that attracts you? Here, in this short talk, is a summary of the subjects that one of the rural stations in the United States of America presents to housewives in its daily programs — subjects that have made the women flock to it with an eagerness beyond compare, and regard Mrs. Martha Duncan, who is in charge of the household management section, as an elder sister by whose advice and opinions they steer themselves in all manner of circumstances.

We have chosen this subject for its novelty, and for the success those programs have achieved: in the last quarter century they have brought about something like a revolution in the ordering of the farm and the arrangement of family affairs in the state of Iowa, and they have also become a model to be followed, not only among rural broadcasting stations but in the cities as well.

Our colleague Mr. Said Jibrin interviewed Martha Duncan on his latest journey to Iowa and recorded this conversation in English; we extract from it what follows, to present a rapid survey of these useful programs:

Iowa is the farmers' state, for they are the majority there, and theirs is the decisive word in the conduct of its affairs. They founded Iowa State College to teach their sons agriculture and the sciences, and to instruct their daughters in the matters of household management; and they founded the broadcasting station attached to the college to be the connecting link between themselves and the college — and the experts in it. So the station's programs came to be arranged entirely for their benefit and their entertainment, and to supply them with the latest news that concerns them. The household management programs are an example of this close cooperation between the farmers on the one hand and the scientific, technical, and cultural institutions on the other, for they take up the sides of rural life and neglect not one of them.

Martha Duncan devotes Monday to the discussion of matters of house and garden: how to plant flowers, sweet herbs, and household vegetables in their several seasons; preparing the soil, selecting the seed, leveling the ground and watering it, and fighting wild weeds and harmful insects.

On Tuesday the household management program turns upon fabrics and clothes and their seasons: the experts speak of the kinds of fabric suited to different occasions, and the ways of sewing them, washing them, ironing them, keeping them and storing them at the season's end, and then of the latest novelties in modern fashions.

The Tuesday programs also usually take up the side of taste, art, and the arrangement of the home: the technical experts talk to the listeners about matching colors, choosing pieces of furniture, and furnishing rooms, and they speak too of ways of preserving what is new among them and of making use of what is old and renewing it. Likewise they undertake to answer, and to send out bulletins to, the listeners who inquire by letter or by telephone.

The Wednesday program carries talks on food and nutrition: it takes up the food values of the foods known in the state of Iowa, and how to present them on the table in an attractive form. The Experts speak of what nourishment the body needs in the stages of its life, and of what the expectant mother should take, and the weaned infant, the working young man, the middle-aged man, and the old man whose bones are all but wasted away — this together with advice and guidance on preserving foods, making use of what is left over, and ways of economizing in food expenses generally while obtaining complete nourishment.

Thursday brings talks on the care of the child, from the time he is an embryo until he grows up, matures, and becomes a working member of society. The housewives listen to the advice of doctors, of kindergarten and elementary school teachers, and of experts in the affairs of the young at school, at home, and in society; and the field is left open for parents to consult those experts on their family affairs and on the problems that confront them in their daily lives.

These household management programs, which Martha Duncan supervises at the Iowa State station, do not neglect the raising of chickens and poultry, which counts for very much in the life of the American farm, for Iowa's income from chickens and eggs alone approaches two hundred million dollars in a single year. Therefore a large part of Friday's program is set aside for talks having to do with poultry in general, and with chickens in particular — talks that lead to the improvement of their breeds, the warding off of disease, increased production, and lightened expenses.

The benefits of these household management programs have shown themselves in the renaissance of the farmers of Iowa — that renaissance which has placed them in the first rank among the farmers of the American land — as they have shown themselves in the encouragement received by Martha Duncan, who directs them: the letters that reach her from her listeners may amount to a thousand letters a day, and this apart from personal visits and telephone conversations.

Perhaps the listeners' opinion of these programs shows itself best in a letter that arrived a few days ago from a housewife living on a remote farm, more than a hundred miles from the nearest city. After thanking Martha Duncan, the housewife says: All week long, as I listen to these useful programs, I feel as if I were still pursuing my studies at the university; not one item of the delightful information that I apply in my daily life escapes me.

These are extracts from the interview with Mrs. Martha Duncan, who is in charge of the household management programs at the Iowa State College station, conducted by our colleague Said Jibrin; we set them down as an example of the extent of the benefit that can be reaped from close cooperation between housewives and a broadcasting station watchful over the good of its listeners.