Victorian England

With doing a little research on Victorian England after having preconceived notions of what women's roles were I learned almost the exact opposite of what i had thought.  Women of that time were not the cookie cutter housewives whose only jobs were to cook, clean, and have as many children as possible.  The economy back then, which was not highly developed, was tough just to live in as it is today. Women needed to work to help support thier families because many of the jobs that the men had didn't make enough money to feed and house thier families. 
The article that I read explained why many would have come to the same conclusion that I had about women at that time.  The cenus in that era did not record many of the women as workers because there would be harsh tax penalties for the family if they showed as having two incomes.  So many women lied about working in factories or being washerwomen to benefit their families.  By just researching for a short time my whole idea of women of that era was changed and corrected.
http://www.victorianweb.org/history/work/burnett2.html