Historical Perspectives on Alcoholism Treatment for Women in the United States, 1870–1990

Abstract

This article discusses different types of treatment modalities for alcoholic women over more than a century of American history, outlining several key themes. First, the notion that there may be fewer alcoholic women than men, but they are somehow “sicker” or more deviant than their male counterparts, has been remarkably persistent. Second, beliefs about maternity and sexuality have long shaped our understanding of alcoholism in women. Third, defining a clinical entity called alcoholism has been particularly difficult in the case of women, for whom any drinking may be viewed as a troublesome behavior. Finally, fitting women into research and treatment models designed for men has been immensely complicated, yet emphasizing gender difference has, in the past, sometimes excluded alcoholic women even more from the care they needed and added to the stigma they faced.

KEYWORDS:

• Alcoholism
• women
• history
• Alcoholics Anonymous
• inebriety

Notes

This research supported in part by a University of Michigan Substance Abuse Research Center (UMSARC) Small Grant.

¹The following discussion is based on a thorough review of the complete run of the Quarterly Journal of Inebriety, beginning with Volume 1 published in 1876 until the journal ceased publication in 1906.

²Surgical removal of ovary or ovaries.

³This analysis of the experiences of early women in the AA fellowship draws on research in the archives of the AA General Service Office, New York City, as well as on published sources noted in references.

⁴Scrapbooks at the AA Archives, General Service Office in New York City include newspaper articles discussing the involvement of women in the movement, and a number of women's personal stories in the “Big Book” of Alcoholics Anonymous emphasize the importance of meeting other women in the fellowship.

⁵This biographical overview has been drawn from research in the Marty Mann Papers (MP), Syracuse University Archives, particularly news coverage of Mann during the period she launched her public health organization, the National Committee for Education on Alcoholism, in 1944. See also Sally Brown and David R. Brown (2001).

⁶This discussion is based on information in the Miriam Van Waters Papers, Schlesinger Library, Radcliffe College. On the increasing commitments of alcoholic women during the 1940s, see Estelle B. Freedman (1996, p. 259).

⁷Of course, Betty Ford's announcement in 1978 that she was seeking treatment for addiction to prescription medication as well as alcoholism helped raise public awareness of addiction among women as well.