Sugared Puppy-Dog Tails:
Gender and Design
Elizabeth F. Churchill

Yahoo! Research | [e-mail] March + April 2010

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When I was a child, there was a rhyme my mother used to recite to me. Here’s how it goes...

What are little boys made of?

Frogs and snails And puppy-dog tails.

That’s what little boys are made of. What are little girls made of? Sugar and spice And all things nice.

That’s what little girls are made of. Personally, I resented this.

Puppy-dog tails obviously wag furiously, and frogs, I’d been told, can jump up to eight feet. The dynamism of tails and frogs seemed so much more delightful than the comparatively inert properties of sugar and spice.

I found hope in Lady Penelope
Creighton-Ward, a character
in the cult 1960s British chil-
dren’s television series “The
Thunderbirds.” Although a
“girl” clearly made of sugar
and spice, she was formidable.
She was the London agent for
International Rescue, a secret
MI6-like organization whose
charter was to save people
and groups from evildoers and
disasters. A 26-year-old British
aristocrat who eschewed the
social scene, she was beauti-
ful, intelligent, and indepen-
dent, not to mention fabulously
dressed and accessorized. She
had an enviable collection of
vehicles, which included a
six-wheeled pink Rolls-Royce
called FAB1 fully loaded with
machine guns in the grill, bul-
letproof glass, water skis for
travel on water, and radar-
assisted steering. Lady Penelope
provided the foundation for my
youthful aspirations. She put
James Bond, 007, in the shade.
There was simply no way to
bond with Bond. I didn’t want
to be a distractible, philander-
ing fop; I wanted the brain,
the haute couture, and the
arsenal of formidable tech-
nology. Lady Penelope has a
number of more recent coun-
terparts, my favorites being
the Powerpuff Girls, who are
tough and fearless and destroy
villains while (as their name
suggests) being made sugar,
spice, and everything nice.