Mother's Work Is Never Done, a Tribute to Moms by Richard Scarry

I went looking for a gift the other day, and in doing so found a new copy of What Do People Do All Day? by Richard Scarry.  It was one of my absolute favorite books in the world as a young child.  The artwork is fun, bright, cheery and amazingly detailed as Scarry gave children a peek at the work-a-day world of making clothes, growing food, baking bread, building roads, and more. 

You can see how beat up well-loved my copy is compared to a brand-spanking new book:

I noticed that the newer edition is much shorter. I was surprised to find that four five of the chapters have been removed.  My copy is a first-edition published in 1968. The only edition of this book that you can buy today is the 1979 abridged edition.  How mysterious!  Why abridge a rather popular children's book? What could be wrong with it?

To start, the endpapers with some of the character art have been removed.  In it Scarry drew the residents of Busytown.  I agree that children really don't need to see characters like this anymore:

Spinster Susie is literally a "spinster" of cotton into thread,
in the "Cotton and How We Use It" chapter (also removed)

However, the chapters about coal and electricity, the water treatment plant, and Sgt. Murphy the Busytown policeman were also removed.  Perhaps the technology in those chapters were a little dated, but frankly most (if not all) of the technology in the other chapters is also outdated.

Ok, but why remove Mother's Work Is Never Done, the chapter about a stay-at-home-mom?  SAHMs still existed in 1979 when the abridged version was published, and they were still working very hard.

Certainly more women with children entered the workforce in the late 1970s than in the 1960s when this chapter was written.  I imagine that perhaps it may not have been politically correct in the late 1970s to depict a woman / wife / mother / girls in a traditional female role.  In some ways this chapter does reinforce traditional roles.  Scarry does have Daddy Pig and Harry being served breakfast in this chapter, but later Harry rather un-traditionally for the time helps with the housework.  

Personally, I think Scarry was trying to equalize what was traditionally regarded as "women's work" when he wrote this chapter. Even today it's possible that a chapter like this one can help children (and adults) realize just how hard a SAHM works all day, and that the work is equal to the work that her partner does. 

What do you think?  Is this chapter too dated for 2012?


Either way, I would just like to say Happy Mother's Day
to all you mothers out there, SAHM or not,
and thank you 

because your work really is never done!