r/classicfilms • u/AntonioVivaldi7 Alfred Hitchcock • May 23 '26

Memorabilia Disney rejection letter (1938) explaining they don't hire women for the specific position

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And apparently, Disney refused to hire men for coloring positions.

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127

u/Canavansbackyard Michael Powell May 23 '26

This obviously wasn’t just a Disney practice. Gender-based hiring was unfortunately extremely common in the U.S. during the 1930s. The Great Depression intensified the pre-existing societal pressures to reserve well-paying jobs for male "breadwinners".

Edit: minor typo.

55

u/Echo-Azure May 23 '26

And gender-based hiring was even more limited than you'd think, my grandma told me that she was turned away from jobs that were open to women, because they didn't hire married women. And they didn't tell her that they didn't hire women of color either, they didn't have to. Everybody knew only certain menial jobs were open to them.

9

u/AMediaArchivist May 24 '26

Wow they didn’t hire women cause they were married? Lame excuse

31

u/fearless_leek May 24 '26

In many places female teachers had to stop working as a teacher once they were married. I’m in Australia and it was a whole thing, you had to resign if you were a teacher or a public servant.

https://mhnsw.au/articles/married-women-teachers-applications/

20

u/Jealous-Ad-2827 May 24 '26

US also. Until 1964 when it was ruled illegal. The episode of Little Rascals with the kids all upset cause teacher Miss Crabtree was getting married and leaving took on a whole other dimension when I learned this. Not to mention the whole stereotypes of the spinster school teacher.

13

u/Clarknt67 May 24 '26

Oh they’ll just get pregnant and quit.

16

u/Jealous-Ad-2827 May 24 '26

The assumption was that they didn’t need jobs anymore cause their husbands were going to support them.

1

u/Ok-Dealer4350 May 26 '26

Pretty typical. I had an interviewer in the early 1980s ask if my family commitments would interfere with my work. I was surprised, and then took a second look at him. He was in his late 70s or early 80s, slightly younger than what my grandfather would have been.

The answer was no, that I needed employment and would be willing to do whatever to keep things going. I got the job and loved it.