Think back even harder although the age of majority in many states was 21 the age to marry without parental consent could have been as young as 14 which I think was Georgia in the mid 1940's. My sisters friends slipped off to Bryson City, NC where I think it was 16 or 18.
Our culture has changed which some folk are not considering in this. Many young married couples for both their economic and their parents economic benefit lived in the same house in many cases. This was especially true in rural areas. It wasn't considered to be unusual for up to four generations to be under one roof.
Of my aunts who married young did their husbands run roughshod over them? LOL Oh no they could hold their own LOL. The truth is kids being brought up today are not being educated by neither parents nor education system to be family oriented or marriage ready. Most of this started at the onset of The Great Society when government began the encouragement of the decline of the family in everything from raising the kids without dads to kicking grandma and grandpa out of the house to be helped by strangers because By Gosh you had a life to live and By Gosh no one best deprive you of doing your thing.
Fathers were encouraged to bed women outside of their marriage if there even was a marriage and women had it drummed in their heads they needed no man.
Phil Roberston likely at the age 16 could have sheltered and fed his family. Why? Because his families survival as a kid depended on it.
Phil and Kay Robertson faced adversity all their life even in the in youth from what I've read. Yet despite in all including Phil's conduct they worked it out thus the results we see today. Their issues wasn't an age issue it was an issue Phil likely got caught up likely starting in college which could have happened at anytime.
No kids today thanks to many things most are not mentally ready to marry even at age 20. Why? Because they have not been made ready to take on life that's why. They've been taught to take on more education and gosh those darn kids can wait till you get your law degree first and establish yourself under your hyphenated professional name. In the mean time biologically by 15 or so the body says times a wasting.
Yes the man should be a few years older than the girl in most cases especially in cases of marriage of a woman under 18 because mentally girls used to mature faster thus the reason they sought older men to marry. Even in high schools girls used to seek out boys a couple grades higher. That was a natural occurrence.
But wait there's an extra added bonus going on today. Girls are giving up on guys in high school and dating other girls. Well I reckon that's better than marrying that college Dude wanting to control her..../Sarcasm.
Whoopsie! You’re in trouble now!
You’ve started making sense.
For Shame!
Yea I experienced that dating /high school thing in the early 80s when all the girls dated a cople grades up as well. But clearly we were both hallucinating, because as we were instructed earlier and repeatedly, such things are myth.
CLEARLY none of our collective life experiences ever happened.
Very true, and a real shame.
My only interest is in not letting people continue the myth that 13 and 14 and 15 and 16 was the normal marriage age of the past.
We covered all this intensely back when the Mormons were trying to convince everyone that the young teen wife, was the norm until just recently.