Today is the birthday of Dr. Benjamin Spock (books by this author), born in New Haven, Connecticut (1903). He wrote The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care (1946). It began, "You know more than you think you do," and it became the parenting bible for all the post-war moms and dads raising the baby boomer generation. People like Spiro Agnew and Norman Vincent Peale blamed his permissive parenting philosophy for the '60s counterculture movement. Spock replied: "Maybe my book helped a generation not to be intimidated by adulthood. When I was young, I was always made to assume that I was wrong. Now young people think they might be right and stand up to authority."
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