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Auto Nation. In Suburbia's pedocracy huge emphasis is placed on activities for the young (Washington's suburban Montgomery County, Md.—pop. 358,000 —spends about $34 million a year on youth programs). The suburban housewife might well be a can-opener cook, but she must have an appointment book and a driver's license and must be able to steer a menagerie of leggy youngsters through the streets with the coolness of a driver at the Sebring trials; the suburban sprawl and the near absence of public transportation generally mean that any destination is just beyond sensible walking distance. Most children gauge walking distance at two blocks. If the theory of evolution is still working, it may well one day transform the suburban housewife's right foot into a flared paddle, grooved for easy traction on the gas pedal and brake.
As her children grow less dependent on her, Suburbia's housewife fills her newfound time with a dizzying assortment of extracurricular projects that thrust her full steam into community life. Beyond the home-centered dinner parties, Kaffeeklatsches and card parties, there is a directory-sized world of organizations devised for husbands as well as for wives (but it is the wife who keeps things organized). In New Jersey's Levittown, a projected 16,000-unit replica of the Long Island original, energetic suburbanites can sign up for at least 35 different organizations from the Volunteer Fire Department to the Great Books Club, and the Lords and Ladies Dance Club, not to mention the proliferating list of adult-education courses that keep the public school lights glowing into the night. "We have a wonderful adult-education program," says Suburbanite (Levittown, L.I.) Muriel Kane (two children), "where women can learn how to fix their own plumbing and everything." Fighting in the Thickets. Since Suburbia was conceived for children (and vice versa), the Suburban housewife is the chief jungle fighter for school expansion and reform. Beyond that the path leads easily to the thickets of local politics. Only recently, after the Montgomery County manager whacked $11 million from the 1961 school budget, the county council was invaded by an indignant posse of 1,000 P.T.A. members. The council scrambled to retreat, not only restored the cuts, but added a few projects of its own for good measure. The tax rate jumped 5¢ per $100 valuation as a result, but there was scarcely a whimper.
To the north, in New York's suburban Scarsdale, the women's sense of responsibility has the same ring. Says Housewife Rhea Hertel (Woman's Club, Neighborhood Association, P.T.A., League of Women Voters): "If you're receiving benefits and not contributing, what kind of person are you?" Adds Scarsdale's Grace Fitzwater (Hitchcock Presbyterian Church, Woman's Club, P.T.A.): "When we lived in New York City, I roared with laughter at this sort of thing. I never knew anyone in the city who was civic; out here I don't know anybody who isn't." Says Florence Willett, 44, who is the new mayor of Detroit's suburban Birmingham: "Women feel a greater need for taking their share of the work. With husbands away at work and hampered by long commuting, women can share and contribute more. Don't ever say we run the suburbs, though."