Author Ernestine Gilbreth Carey, one of several surviving children from efficiency experts Frank Bunker Gilbreth Sr. and Lillian Moller Gilbreth's large brood, has died at the age of 98. Mrs. Carey, along with a younger brother, Frank Bunker Gilbreth Jr., co-authored the memoir Cheaper by the Dozen, a hilarious account of life in the Gilbreth clan.
The book and its sequel, Belles on Their Toes, were later adapted for stage and film, though the most recent movies appropriating the title "Cheaper by the Dozen" have little to do with the original story.
Here's to a woman who made generations of readers laugh themselves silly.
http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0136950/http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/06/books/06carey.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&adxnnlx=1163172063-tN3FNzICV23rIjFWHHInTA The charming havoc of “Cheaper by the Dozen” found a wide audience just after World War II. Mrs. Carey and her brother mined a rich vein of humorous and quirky material from the Gilbreth clan. Mrs. Carey, the third child, and Frank, the fifth, plumbed what appeared to be the best of living in a brood that size.
An outing in their Pierce-Arrow, with Dad at the wheel and babies tucked in the front seat near Mother in the days before seat belts, felt “like a back somersault off the high diving board.” The household was described as “organized confusion,” resembling a “newspaper on election night.” In their house in Montclair, N.J., servants took care of cooking and gardening, although every child was assigned to look after a younger sibling and performed other tasks.
Given their father’s penchant for order, “nothing was considered more of a sin in our house than wasted time and motions,” the authors wrote. Dad, though a benevolent soul, ran a household that was above all else driven to learn. Language records were played in the bathrooms while the children washed; they absorbed French and German that was later recited at the dinner table. Mealtime could be as intense as a board meeting, since “no one could talk unless the subject was of general interest.” Practical jokes, centered around Dad, defused the tension.And I couldn't resist adding the Miss Snark link here:
http://misssnark.blogspot.com/2006/11/ernestine-gilbreth-carey.html