Credit Cards

How it started

Store credit already existed by the early 1900s, but only as a single retailer’s charge account, tied to one store rather than something a person could carry from place to place. That changed in 1950, when Diners ClubThe first universal charge card, founded by Frank McNamara in New York. Usable across many restaurants and businesses at once, not just one store. launched as the first card usable across many different restaurants and businesses at once.1

When women were let in

Getting one of those cards was a different matter depending on who was applying. A single woman applying on her own often needed a male cosigner, a father or a brother, regardless of her own income. A married woman needed her husband’s signature just to get a card at all, and even then the account was opened in his name, not hers, tied to his credit history rather than her own.2

The Equal Credit Opportunity ActU.S. federal law signed October 28, 1974. Made it illegal for lenders to discriminate against credit applicants based on sex or marital status., signed into law in 1974, made this illegal, barring lenders from discriminating on the basis of sex or marital status. Mortgage lenders had also been routinely discounting a married woman’s income when she applied for a loan, especially if she was of childbearing age, one of the specific practices the law was written to stop.3

Bella AbzugU.S. Representative from New York (1971–1977). A leading voice for women’s rights in Congress; introduced the first version of this bill in 1971. introduced the bill in Congress in 1971. Margaret HecklerU.S. Representative from Massachusetts (1967–1983), serving on the House Banking Committee. Had been personally denied a mortgage in 1957 despite being a practicing attorney., who had been personally denied a mortgage herself, drafted the language that eventually passed. When an early committee draft left out sex and marital status as protected categories, Lindy BoggsU.S. Representative from Louisiana (1973–1991). Later became U.S. Ambassador to the Vatican. retyped the page herself, handed copies to the rest of the committee, and told them she assumed it had simply been an oversight. The committee adopted her wording unanimously.4