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Women in advertising during the 1950s

After the war, a woman’s place once more became the home. William Beveridge, the man charged with shaping Britain’s future, believed housewives had “vital work to do in ensuring the adequate continuance of the British race”. The same advertisers who had previously celebrated women’s war efforts, now encouraged women to fight ‘germs’ not ‘Germans’.

Housework and family life became a woman’s principle route to fulfilment and achievement. But the advertiser’s image wasn't the whole story, in fact, 22% of married women continued to work after the war, and the number increased throughout the 1950s.

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4 minutes