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After fighting in World War II, American soldiers coming home faced another duty of sorts to their country: get happily married, have a baby, and nurture a stable, healthy family. Among those encouraging that wartime effort was Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA). The birth control organization published illustrated pamphlets aimed at veterans as well as women that provided firm, authoritative guidance on how to best prepare to start a family. They gave them titles like “The Soldier Takes a Wife” and “For the Man who comes back — and for all his generation,” and included quizzes in their pages such as, “As a prospective mother — what’s your score?”

Librarians at New York Academy of Medicine recently found examples of these illuminating documents in their archives, coinciding with a free lecture series it’s hosting with the Museum of the City of New York titled, “Who Controls Women’s Health? A Century of Struggle.”

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