Part 21

But The Feminine Mystique was only the first of many contributions that Friedan has made to the women's movement. In 1966 she founded the National Organization for Women (NOW), which today has more than 70,000 members and is by far the most effective feminist group in the world. She has written a second book, It Changed My Life, made countless appearances on radio and television, and become one of the most sought-after lecturers in the country. Despite her public image as a hard core activist, Betty Friedan at 58 is a charming, decidedly feminine woman who enjoys wearing makeup and colorful dresses. In an interview at her brightly decorated apartment high above Lincoln Center, she reveals that these two aspects of her personality are not at all contradictory.

"The women's movement had to come. It was an evolutionary thing," she says, in robust, throaty, rapid-fire bursts of speech interspersed with long pauses. "If I had not articulated these ideas in 1963, by '66 somebody else would have. I think that it's good that I did, because what I had to say somehow got to the essence of it, which is the personhood of woman, and not what later obscured it, with a woman-against-man kind of thing."

It was largely through the lobbying efforts of NOW that the U.S. Senate last October approved a three-year extension of the deadline for ratifying the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). So far, 35 of the required 38 states have voted for the amendment. The new deadline is June 30, 1982.

"There's no question that three more states will pass it by that time," says Friedan. "But it's not going to be easy, because there are these well financed right-wing campaigns trying to block it. They understand that the ERA is not only the symbol but the substance of what women have won -- that it will give them constitutional underpinning forevermore, so that they can't push women back to the second-class status of the cheap labor pool.

"The ERA will not do anything dramatic -- like change the bathrooms -- but it will ensure, for example, that women have their own right for social security, which they don't have now. You have to realize that the reactionary forces in this country are using the sexual issue as a kind of smoke screen, to create a hate movement. They're the same forces that tried to prevent labor from organizing, that burnt crosses on lawns in the South, that painted swastikas on synagogues. ... NOW has made it the priority, because if the ERA is blocked, it will be the signal to take back everything."

A woman who smiles and laughs easily in spite of her intensity, Friedan prefers to be called not Miss, Ms., or Mrs., but simply Betty. Born in Peoria, Illinois, she majored in psychology at Smith College and graduated summa cum laude. In June, 1947, after moving to New York City, she married Carl Friedan, then a theatrical producer. Three children later, the Friedans moved to the suburbs, and it was there that she formulated the ideas for The Feminine Mystique.

Divorced since 1969, Friedan maintains a very close relationship with her children, who are at Columbia University, the University of California, Berkeley graduate school, and Harvard Medical School. A Westsider since 1964, she runs in Central Park for an hour each day.

Of the half dozen major projects she's involved in at the moment, the most significant is her new book, The Fountain of Age. "It's about the last third of life," she explains. "I call it the new third of life, because many women have only begun to discover that it exists."

Asked about her chief pleasures in life, she replies with obvious satisfaction, "I like parties, I like my friends, I like talking, I like dancing. ... One thing I've discovered is that the stronger you get, the more you can be soft and gentle and tender, and also have fun. I demand my right to be funny and to have fun, and not just to always be deadly serious."

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WESTSIDER ARTHUR FROMMER Author of Europe on $10 a Day

10-8-78

His name rhymes with "roamer" and that's an accurate description of Westsider Arthur Frommer, author of Europe on $10 a Day.

In 1957, when he wrote the first edition, Europe On $5 a Day, Arthur was a dedicated New York lawyer. But the book became so popular that he finally decided, after much agonizing, to leave his law firm and become a full-time travel writer. Every year in the past two decades, Arthur and his wife Hope have revisited the 17 European cities covered in the book; they have distilled the wisdom from thousands of letters received from readers; and they have revised and updated the famous travel book for the new edition each spring. It is still the world's best selling guide to Europe.

"This is not necessarily the glamorous occupation that some people imagine it to be," says Arthur, biting into a sandwich as he, Hope and their daughter Pauline invite me to join them at the dinner table at their Central Park West home. "One of the hazards of being a travel writer is that when you're on vacation, you're always checking to see where the bargains are, or whether the restaurants are worth their reputation. I've visited so many exotic cities of the world that for me, the best way to relax is to stay home."

Due to a miscommunication on my part, I arrive on an evening exactly one week later than the Frommers have expected me, yet they manage such a warm welcome that I end up staying three hours. They seem to have plenty of time to talk. Still, there is a reminder throughout the evening that they lead very busy lives -- the constantly ringing telephone.

One reason for my lengthy visit is that it takes place on the same night as the second heavyweight championship boxing match between Muhammad Ali and Leon Spinks. Arthur and I sit on his living room couch, watching the fight live on TV with great interest, rooting for Ali and resuming our interview between the rounds. Ali, who had lost the first fight with Spinks the previous February, beats him handily this time.

"I'm a workaholic," confesses Arthur, excusing himself while he gets up to answer another call from overseas. An energetic, detail-oriented man, Arthur once worked 12 hours a day writing legal briefs and eight hours a day on his book. Today he is the head of Arthur Frommer Enterprises, an international corporation that includes a publishing company, a charter service and four hotels -- two in the Caribbean and two in Europe.

Publishing remains his biggest enterprise. He publishes 30 to 40 travel guides each year, ranging in subject matter from the Far East to New York City. Europe On $10 A Day has for many years been co-authored by his wife Hope. "While Arthur is on the streets grubbing for bargains," she says, "I'm in the museums."

With her own career as an actress and director, Hope does not fly the Atlantic quite as often as her husband. Says Arthur: "I go to Europe like other people commute to Long Island. Sometimes I go without even a change of clothes."

Twelve-year-old Pauline Frommer made her first trip to Europe at the age of two and a half months. Bright and precocious, she seems a natural to succeed her father in the business one day.

Arthur Frommer's success story began shortly after he graduated from Yale Law School in 1953. While serving in the Army in Europe, he used every weekend to travel. "At the end of my stay in the Army," he recalls, "having nothing to do, I sat down and wrote a little volume called The GI Guide to Europe. It was written strictly from memory; it had no prices or phone numbers. I went home and started practicing law. Then I got a cable saying that all 50,000 copies had sold out immediately."

Arthur used his first summer vacation from the law firm to go back to Europe and rewrite his travel guide, for civilian readers. It became "a monster which ate up my life." But he has never regretted his choice of careers.

"The book coincided with a revolution of American travel habits," says Arthur, not giving himself credit for being a prime force behind this revolution. "When I was in college, it was unheard of for young people to go off to Europe. It was too far, too expensive. The students of the early 1960s became the first students in history to travel in great numbers to Europe. Many people think the country was greatly changed by this massive travel."

Arthur and Hope moved to the West Side in 1965, just after their daughter was born. Among their favorite neighborhood businesses: DelPino Shoes, which has some of the lowest prices in the city for quality Italian footwear, and the Jean Warehouse, where Pauline buys many of her clothes.

These days, while Hope is busy directing a play by Pamela O'Neill, Arthur is working on several new projects. One is a course he will be teaching at the New School starting in February. Titled "Great Cities of Western Europe," the course will concentrate on urban problems and their political and social solutions.

But Arthur's biggest ambition these days is to expand his company's week-long chartered tour of Jerusalem into a two-week package for Jerusalem and Cairo. Such a tour, he believes, would help create a bond of understanding in the Middle East.

"It's a dream of mine," says Arthur, "that we might be a force for peace sometime. It may not happen overnight, but I'm sure it will come."