--- title: National Housewife's Day: The School for Bored Housewives description: On National Housewife's Day, LIFE looks back at a school founded in the 1960s to provide education to women whose work was in the home. canonical: https://time.com/4000588/school-for-bored-housewives/ author: Eliza Berman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2015-11-03T14:00:25.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:02:01.299Z og:title: How a California School Cured 'Advanced Cases of Housewife Boredom' og:description: On National Housewife's Day, LIFE looks back at a school founded in the 1960s to provide education to women whose work was in the home. og:url: https://time.com/4000588/school-for-bored-housewives/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt427779f16cf906ad/69885fa135ba6f71a1c0eb57/150817-bored-housewives-01.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2560 og:image:height: 1440 og:image:alt: Everywoman's Village 1966 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: How a California School Cured 'Advanced Cases of Housewife Boredom' twitter:description: On National Housewife's Day, LIFE looks back at a school founded in the 1960s to provide education to women whose work was in the home. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt427779f16cf906ad/69885fa135ba6f71a1c0eb57/150817-bored-housewives-01.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # How a California School Cured 'Advanced Cases of Housewife Boredom' > Sponsored content. 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Worth Your Time is TIME's culture recommendation newsletter, edited by culture editor Eliza Berman. Twice a week it surfaces the books, shows, films and ideas TIME's editors think are worth your attention, and explains why. It is free at time.com/newsletters. #### Does TIME have a culture newsletter? Yes. Worth Your Time is TIME's culture newsletter, published Tuesdays and Saturdays. #### Who writes TIME's culture recommendations? Culture editor Eliza Berman writes Worth Your Time, drawing on TIME's critics and culture desk. #### Is Worth Your Time free? Yes. It is a free newsletter available at time.com/newsletters.  by [Eliza Berman](https://time.com/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Nov 3, 2015 2:00 PM UTC  Caption from LIFE. Two of the Village's most popular nonacademic courses are sculpture and ballet where students do limbering exercises. Caption from LIFE. Two of the Village's most popular nonacademic courses are sculpture and ballet where students do limbering exercises. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  by [Eliza Berman](https://time.com/author/eliza-berman/)  ## Eliza Berman Berman is a senior editor at TIME. Nov 3, 2015 2:00 PM UTC In 1963, [Betty Friedan](http://time.com/3711230/betty-friedan/) published _The Feminine Mystique_, announcing to the world that an epidemic of boredom and joylessness was sweeping the nation’s housewives. That same year, a trio of housewives in Van Nuys, Calif., developed a remedy: a center for adult education called Everywoman’s Village, which, LIFE explained, “offers familiar cures for advanced cases of housewife boredom.” The founders of Everywoman’s Village—Chris Edwards, Diane Rosner and Lynn Selwyn—did not create the school as a deliberate response to the problem Friedan described. According to LIFE, they “have never burst into tears while alone with their vacuum cleaners.” But they recognized a need for women like them to have a space to continue learning. After all, half of the 800 women who quickly enrolled had bachelor’s degrees, and some had completed graduate studies. The Village offered classes in papier-mâché and sculpture, ballet and yoga. For $24, a mother or housewife could enroll in a 9-week course to fill what little time she had left after completing her duties at home. For empty-nesters in particular, the school could help her find purpose in her new-found free time, as LIFE explained: --- > “” --- LIFE described the Village as “a halfway house between the kitchen and the future.” Women who spent their days at home, the founders explained, could feel cut off from the world outside. But here, they had an opportunity to reconnect. The language the magazine used to describe the school’s offerings subtly acknowledged Friedan’s argument: “They seem to be perfectly ordinary suburban women except for one thing—they looked absorbed and contented.” Even as the number of women in the workplace increased, Everywoman’s Village found a steady flow of customers. And they were not only housewives—or, to use a term preferred by some today, [primary caretakers](http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx%5Ffactor/2013/03/26/housewife%5Fhomemaker%5For%5Fstay%5Fat%5Fhome%5Fmom%5Fwhat%5Fshould%5Fwe%5Fcall%5Fwomen%5Fwho%5Fdon.html). In response to popular demand, the Village eventually opened its doors to men. When the Los Angeles _Times_ profiled the school in 1994, it had updated its course offerings to include classes on “how to dance sensually for your man” and how to use the computer program WordPerfect. Five years later, however, it was forced to shut its doors in the face of financial difficulties. But for the stay-at-home wives and mothers who flocked to the Van Nuys campus in 1963, the Village was more than a place to pick up new skills. It was an oasis of community. “I haven’t been to my gynecologist since I enrolled,” said one student. “Now I have better things to do than brood about my ovaries.” _Liz Ronk, who edited this gallery, is the Photo Editor for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter_ [_@lizabethronk_](https://twitter.com/LizabethRonk)_._  Caption from LIFE. Two of the Village's most popular nonacademic courses are sculpture and ballet where students do limbering exercises. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Students at Everywomen's Village in Van Nuys, California. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Students tote their own exercise mats to their class, "Yoga and You." Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. In yoga class, two pupils struggle to hold a position designed to improve intelligence and memory. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Students at Everywomen's Village in Van Nuys, California. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Students at Everywomen's Village in Van Nuys, California. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. A sculpture pupil, with instructor's help, makes some final cuts. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Student at Everywomen's Village in Van Nuys, California. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. In a crowded oil-painting class students study their reflections in a mirror for self portraits. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Two of the most popular nonacademic courses are sculpture where a housewife touches up a papier-mache creation and ballet. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Student at Everywomen's Village in Van Nuys, California. Ralph Crane—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. Founders, advisors, and part of the Village faculty fill the porch of Old Main. 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