Television and the Unmarried Career Woman

by Guy Belleranti


The Mary Tyler Moore Show of the 1970’s is often pointed to as groundbreaking because it featured a single career woman as the program’s main star. However, a number of unmarried career women preceded Mary Tyler Moore’s Mary Richards on television.

Perhaps the earliest of these was on the comedy Our Miss Brooks. Starring Eve Arden as school teacher Connie Brooks, this series actually had its start on radio in 1948. When it moved to television in 1952 both Eve Arden and Gale Gordon moved with it. Gordon played Osgood Conklin, the pompous principal at the school where Brooks taught English. The series ran on CBS through the 1956 season, and even led to a 1956 film of the same name that featured the major actors from the television series.

Another early television program featuring an unattached career woman was Private Secretary. Airing on CBS from 1953 to 1957, this sitcom starred Ann Sothern as Susie McNamara, a secretary to a talent agent. Other primary people on the program included Don Porter as the talent agent, Peter Sands, and Ann Tyrrell as Violet “Vi” Preskins, Susie’s friend and co-worker.

Ann Sothern followed up this comedy with another titled appropriately enough The Ann Sothern Show. On this program Sothern played Katy O’Connor, assistant manager of the fancy Bartley House Hotel in New York City. The series ran from 1958 to 1961. Interestingly, the two major supporting players on this program were again Don Porter and Ann Tyrrell. Porter played O’Connor’s boss and manager of the hotel, James Devery. Tyrrell played Olive Smith, Katy’s secretary.

Another comedy featuring an independent single woman was That Girl. Airing from 1966 to 1971 it starred Marlo Thomas as Ann Marie, a struggling New York City actress. Ted Bessell played her boyfriend Donald “Don” Hollinger. Also having important parts in the program were Lew Parker and Rosemary DeCamp as Ann Marie’s parents.

Finally, from 1968 to 1971 came the television sitcom Julia. This program broke new ground in two ways. First, the main character, Julia (played by Diahann Carroll), was a single and independent black woman. Second, Julia was a widow raising a young son while working as a nurse. Today, a series about a single working mother wouldn’t be at all out of the ordinary, but in the late 1960’s it was very different indeed.

There were several other important single career women characters in television programs of the 1950’s and 1960’s -- women like Kitty on Gunsmoke, Della Street on Perry Mason and Sally Rogers on The Dick Van Dyke Show.  However, unlike the women leads in Our Miss Brooks, Private Secretary, Julia, etc, these women were not their program’s primary focal point. Still, all were strong characters, and each helped pave the way for series such as The Mary Tyler Moore Show, Rhoda, Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, Murphy Brown, Ellen and more.

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