The Millionaire Who Created A Baby Boom In 1920s Canada

How did these women plan on maximizing their fertility efforts? During the Great Depression, women did not have the benefit of hormones and other pharmaceuticals to increase their fertility. Humans are not like factories, and a woman's womb cannot push out a fresh baby like an assembly line, so what options did parents in the 1930s have?

In those days, presumably people were aware of women's ovulation cycles, as fertility rates had dropped, according to FiveThirtyEight. Women in the race at least had a rudimentary means of planning for their next baby. Whether or not they were aware of it, they could have also weaned their babies early to increase their chances. However, early weaning is risky for both mother and baby. It can increase the risk of obesity and cancer, babies lose out on many benefits from breast milk, and it can increase their chances of sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), as Verywell reports.

What about the frequency? Having multiple children with little rest in between could be deadly for some women. The baby derby was increasing women's risk of miscarriages, damaged uteri, premature birth, and anemia, among other serious conditions (via Mayo Clinic). According to the Mayo Clinic, these risks increase with the age of the mother and reports the ideal interval between pregnancies is 18 to 24 months.

This would mean that each participant would have had to be pregnant practically twice a year for 10 years, with live births, just to win.

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