Remembering My Father: An Intellectual Portrait of “The Man Who Saved Marriages”

This chapter provides a brief description of Paul Popenoe's marriage, his father-role, and his family, in some respects, a social cost-benefit analysis of the traditional nuclear family—only one family, to be sure, but prototypic of its time. Paul Popenoe was largely a man of the nineteenth century. Paul Popenoe's television and radio popularity was no doubt generated by his strong and unique personality. Paul Popenoe was a mostly self-educated and self-made man. Intellectually, the young Paul Popenoe was a true child of the Progressive era, a combination of Darwinian scientist, William James pragmatist, and Teddy Roosevelt progressive. In this brief description of Paul Popenoe's marriage, his father-role, and his family, you have, in some respects, a social cost-benefit analysis of the traditional nuclear family—only one family, to be sure, but prototypic of its time. In summary, it was very good for men, quite good for children, and not so good for women.