Time Archive: Where Are All the Fathers?

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The redefinition of fatherhood has been going on in virtually every arena of American life for well over 20 years. As women worked to broaden their choices at home and work, the implicit invitation was for men to do likewise. As Levine has observed, Dr. Spock had carefully revised his advice on fathers by 1974. The earlier version suggested that fathers change the occasional diaper and cautioned mothers about "trying to force the participation of fathers who get gooseflesh at the very idea of helping to take care of a baby." The new version of Baby and Child Care, by contrast, offered a prescription for the New Fatherhood: "The father -- any father -- should be sharing with the mother the day-to-day care of their child from birth onward . . . This is the natural way for the father to start the relationship, just as it is for the mother."

By the '80s, bookstores were growing fat with titles aimed at men: How to Father, Expectant Father, Pregnant Fathers, The Birth of a Father, Fathers Almanac and Father Power. There were books about child-and-father relations, like How to Father a Successful Daughter, and then specific texts for part- time fathers, single fathers, stepfathers and homosexual fathers. Bill Cosby's Fatherhood was one of the best-selling books in publishing history, and Good Morning, Merry Sunshine, by Chicago Tribune columnist Bob Greene, a journal about his first year of fatherhood, was on the New York Times best- seller list for almost a year. Parents can now pick up Parents' Sports, a new magazine dedicated to reaching the dad market with stories on the joys of soccer practice.

Institutions were changing too. In his book Fatherhood in America, published this month, Robert L. Griswold has traced the history of a fast-changing role that today not only allows men in the birthing room (90% of fathers are in attendance at their child's birth) but also offers them postpartum courses in which new fathers learn how to change, feed, hold and generally take care of their infant. Some fathers may even get in on the pregnancy part by wearing the "empathy belly," a bulge the size and weight of a third-trimester fetus. Suddenly available to men hoping to solidify the father-child bond are "Saturday with Daddy Outings," special songfests, field trips and potlucks with dads. Even men behind bars could get help: one program allows an inmate father to read children's stories onto cassette tapes that are then sent, along with the book and a Polaroid picture of Dad, to his child.

"It's become cool to be a dad," says Wyatt Andrews, a correspondent for CBS News who has three children: Rachel, 8, Averil, 7, and Conrad, 5. "Even at dinner parties, disciplinary techniques are discussed. Fathers with teenagers give advice about strategies to fathers with younger kids. My father was career Navy. I don't think he ever spent two seconds thinking about strategies of child rearing. If he said anything, it was, 'They listen to me.' "

BRING BACK DAD