Sidonie Matsner Gruenberg (1881–1974) was a

parenting Parenting or child rearing promotes and supports the physical, emotional, social, spiritual and intellectual development of a child from infancy to adulthood. Parenting refers to the intricacies of raising a child and not exclusively for a ...

expert, writer, and director of the Child Study Association of America. In her 1912 book ''Your Child Today and Tomorrow'', Gruenberg popularized the idea of giving an allowance to children so they could understand how to spend it.

Life

Sidonie Gruenberg was born in

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

and educated in

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

and

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. She married Benjamin Gruenberg, a biology teacher, in 1903, and had four children between 1907–1915: Herbert, Richard, Hilda, and Ernest. In her parenting books, she said that children do not have any

moral A moral (from Latin ''morālis'') is a message that is conveyed or a lesson to be learned from a story or event. The moral may be left to the hearer, reader, or viewer to determine for themselves, or may be explicitly encapsulated in a maxim. A ...

actions, so parents should permit actions to help them grow in their individual expression. Gruenberg rejected what she saw as "arbitrary

puritanism The Puritans were English Protestants in the 16th and 17th centuries who sought to purify the Church of England of Roman Catholic practices, maintaining that the Church of England had not been fully reformed and should become more Protestant. P ...

" in American parenting, saying that strict parents suggest "every desire and impulse of being Satanic." On behalf of

Macy's Macy's (originally R. H. Macy & Co.) is an American chain of high-end department stores founded in 1858 by Rowland Hussey Macy. It became a division of the Cincinnati-based Federated Department Stores in 1994, through which it is affiliated wi ...

, she lectured at an exposition on "why children should have

toys A toy or plaything is an object that is used primarily to provide entertainment. Simple examples include toy blocks, board games, and dolls. Toys are often designed for use by children, although many are designed specifically for adults and pe ...

" in 1928.

References

External links

*
Sidonie Gruenberg
in ''Notable American Women'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Gruenberg, Sidonie 1881 births 1974 deaths American family and parenting writers 20th-century American non-fiction writers 20th-century American women writers American women non-fiction writers