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PaperclipPerfector  13d ago (text post)   29611 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of March 17, 2025

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"The Wizard of Oz was banned by public libraries in 1928 because the book was deemed ungodly for “depicting women in strong leadership roles.”"

I can't believe this is what dragged me back, but damn it, you're talking about books and this is important. After this, I will sink back into my bog and decent obscurity.

So the tl;dr here is "that's a myth".

The longer version? What I'm always banging on about: go to the primary sources! Where did you get this factoid? Apparently from a site named Canterbury Books. Okay, where did they get it? Well, there's a couple of possible sources, since this gets quoted around the place.

An aside: "The Wizard of Oz" was not banned by all public libraries in 1928 but only by the Chicago Public Library and the reason isn't readily available. The Oz books have been banned at various times, for reasons ranging from (yes) concerns about witchcraft and occultism to Communism! since Oz doesn't have money or an economic system, to "it's outdated, irrelevant to modern children, it's fantasy and they should be reading about the real world, kids today want to read about submarines and missiles". That one comes from a lady library professional in Florida in 1959 and she was tweaked about it by an article in Life:

Dr. Dorothy Dodd, state librarian, has urged all public libraries in Florida to withdraw from circulation the following books: Uncle Wiggly, Tom Swift, Tarzan, the Bobbsey Twins, the Wizard of Oz, Horatio Alger, the Campfire Girls, the Hardy Boys, and others of that ilk. Dr. Dodd says these books are “poorly written, untrue to life, sensational, foolishly sentimental and consequently unwholesome for the children in your community.”

Nothing there about Stronk Female Wammen being Leaderines. So where did this come out of? Seemingly from an essay by some lassie writing a thesis:

Do many Americans still have a problem with accepting women as leaders? I personally don’t think there’s much of an argument there, and people who see the question as redundant marvel at how long archaic attitudes about women in power have persisted. At least these days we can openly have the—often highly inflamed—conversation about sexism in business, entertainment, and government. And we can support a cultural industry thriving on strong female characters in fiction, film, and television. Not so much in 1928, when the Chicago Public Library banned The Wizard of Oz, writes Kristina Rosenthal at the University of Tulsa Department of Special Collections, “arguing that the story was ungodly for ‘depicting women in strong leadership roles.’”

Okay, so what did Ms. Rosenthal say? Well, that's hard to find because the link keeps timing out, but it looks like she might be relying on what some other guy said:

Back in March 2013, R. Wolf Baldassarro posted a blog essay about objections to the book. Baldassarro isn’t a librarian, educator, or scholar. He’s a “seasoned paranormal investigator” who happens to feel strongly about book banning.

I found several faults with that essay, including falling for a 2004 Deadbrain hoax about Jerry Falwell and misquoting sources.

Baldassarro’s essay also said about the book:

Nevertheless, it has come under attack several times. Ministers and educators challenged it for its “ungodly” influence and for depicting women in strong leadership roles. They opposed not only children reading it, but adults as well, lest it undermine longstanding gender roles.

In 1928, the city of Chicago banned it from all public libraries.

Note that the words “depicting women in strong leadership roles” were Baldassarro’s own. While ascribing that thought to “Ministers and educators,” he didn’t cite any source, person, place, or date for that complaint.

Despite (or because of) how it overstated the evidence, Baldassarro’s essay got quoted on Buzzfeed and other sites.

Then this February Kristina Rosenthal at the University of Tulsa’s McFarlane Library posted her own essay on the book’s troubles with librarians and censors, which said:

In 1928 all public libraries banned the book arguing that the story was ungodly for “depicting women in strong leadership roles”. This argument remained the common defense against the novels from ministers and educators through the 1950s and 60s.

Baldassarro’s statement about a supposed policy in Chicago thus became a statement about “all public libraries,” and his phrase “depicting women in strong leadership roles” appeared as if it were a direct quotation from those 1928 book banners. That’s shoddy scholarship.

So to sum it up: the Oz book(s) were banned at various times for various reasons, but not a blanket ban in 1928 and, so far as I can tell, not for having Strong Independent Lead Female Characters Who Don't Need No Man.

As ever, when engaging in historical discourse, GO. BACK. TO. THE. PRIMARY. SOURCES.

Now I submerge back into the mud and darkness. Glub, glub.

I regret you were too late but Nybbler already beat you to it, so we had traced back to Baldassaro and also to another article in the Chicago Tribune from 2000 which has another unsourced quote about the 1928 ban in Chicago. Though as knowledge is its own reward so I hope you do not feel your time wasted!

Still being banned for being communist means my overall point holds thankfully.

Don't know who you were originally, but this is the kind of comment I read the Motte for.

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