[William Terrell]

Yes. Women have always worked. Married women didn't always work, but only in times of dire economic stress. Consider, if it had been always custom for married women to hold down a job there would be no debate about it; there would have been no change to call attention to it.

If you really want to know precisely what the customs and conditions in an era were, read appellate and supreme court cases occurring in that period. Most of the time the judgments and rulings in a case depended on the peripheral economic, political and societal environment at the time. Such courts had (and have) teams of legal assistants for that kind of research, and much about a period was discussed in the opinions.

History books are frequently a bad source for history. Not all, but, nowadays, most.

[ninenot]

A very good suggestion. OTOH, given the prolixity of some lawyer-friends of mine, I may not live long enough to read a few sessions' decisions.