Moving In: Kath Five

The Northern Virginia subdivision where this experiment would take place had recently been built and was ready for the Spartan Housewives on February 9, 1953. Here are their letters and diaries from when they moved in.
Five wrote this letter to his father Dr. Richard Zwingli on February 10, 1953:

Dearest Father,

We have embarked on our latest adventure! Moving in and on Jake's birthday too, though we were never birthday people. The natives of Northern Virginia are friendly, so don’t worry about us. Jake will miss his friends in Tel Aviv, but we all agree it’s for the best he’s been moved to the embassy in DC. There will be a lot he will have to adjust to but it’s unlikely he will be kidnapped here.^[1] It shall be a great period of adjustment for me as well, finally back in the good ol’ United States of America. So much has changed since I last lived here full-time, it is like living in a foreign country! I am sure I won’t be bored as I settle down to live as a housewife. There is always my private photography projects to keep me company. I don’t have to worry about publishing my photographs anymore so perhaps I can have fun with it now.

My neighbor Marge Six visited me. She is a real cowgirl. Tough as nails. She used to run a ranch in Reno where all the divorced ladies stay so they can get their residency requirements. No, I don’t need her services, Jake and I are ever so happy. However, she found her job got depressing and her husband Bruce got his dream job working as a geologist for the Department of the Interior. We were getting along until I said it was horrid the United States dropped a Bomb on those lovely Japanese cities and Marge said it would have been more horrid if we hadn’t. I wondered how she could believe that when she should know the effects of the Bomb and she said better them than us. Such a ghastly opinion. Still, I believe with time we’ll be able to see each other’s point of view. I don’t think she’ll convert to Quakerism anytime soon, but we can still be friends.

I also met my other next door neighbor Joan Four. She isn’t as much of a world traveler as me but she was stationed in Tokyo and worked as a secretary for the man who is now her husband, Louis. She fell in love with Japan like I have fallen in love with the world. She agreed with me we shouldn’t have dropped the bombs. I think she was impressed by how much art work I have amassed over the years, especially the masks from Polynesia. I am definitely sure I can be friends with her.

My neighbor Betty visited me. She was very interested in Jake’s stories, but I suppose everyone is interested in his stories. So much happened in his life. Not many people can say they were in both a Nazi and a Japanese POW camp. However, she did seem overly glum about losing China. You know me, I think it was a shame China went Communist, but if you’ve seen the behavior I have seen from ex-pats abroad you can’t blame the Chinaman for not trusting us. Well, if Betty can’t be my friend, she can at least be Jake’s. I have never been the jealous wife, you know, not like other wives you know.

I know my beloved Gamze is settling in nicely. Jake still keeps claiming Gamze is saying “Jake Five is the world’s biggest treacle-arse” but I think he’s just imagining in, Gamze is the sweetest little boy and nobody around here would say such awful things for a bird to repeat. Of course Gamze is going to bit Jake if Jake keeps putting his finger near his mouth, he’s a parrot! ^[2] Gamze gets along with everyone else, so Jake will just have to deal with him.

Did you ever imagine that your only daughter would end up a housewife in suburban America? All this time I’ve been living like another one of your sons and now I have a husband and a toddler who I actually bore in my own body. I even wear dresses these days. I’m not sure the natives here would accept me wearing slacks, even if it is just to shovel out the driveway. Yes, the natives where I went before didn’t always approve of a woman wearing slacks, but they could let it slide when it was a foreigner. I’m supposed to be a native here.

I hope we can make it up to Connecticut for Easter this year. I will be ever so thrilled to be able to sit in your lap again as you smoke your pipe and speak about your day, just like when I was a little girl. Your grandson Georgie is also getting so big, I don’t think we can both fit on your lap now.

Your Loving Daughter,
Kath

P.S. Tell mother I said hello.^[3]

1. Jake Five (they/she) was a consular officer at the Australian Embassy to Israel, but in 1952, they were kidnapped by Palestinian freedom fighters who confused them with a local Israeli politician. Jake tried to tell them that she was an Australian named Jake Five, but they claimed a Jew would lie about that. Some time after she was released, Australia moved her to the same position in DC. ↩︎
2. Gamze is Five’s African Grey parrot, bought off a merchant in Istanbul in 1948. ↩︎
3. Five had not spoken directly to his mother since the death of his older brother Jimmy in 1929 from an apparent suicide, though Five and the rest of the family insisted it was from a failed summoning for a succubus. ↩︎