This is borne out by the announcements column included in many YC newsletters. In the June 1956 newsletter of the Weybridge YCs, for example, the announcements column reads: "Our congratulations to Mollie Walter on her engagement and to Margaret Webb and Mike Allen on their marriage." In the following issue, the editors were again delighted to announce the engagement of Brian Gunn (branch deputy vice chairman) to Christine Gray (branch secretary). The editor of Rushcliffe Roundabout, meanwhile, was beside himself with excitement when he was able to announce: "Let's start with the good news — the engagements and marriages — and this time we have five!"

Gender equality within branches, however, was almost non-existent. Whereas men tended to be chairmen, deputy chairmen and chief branch officers, women were inevitably secretaries. When the Weybridge YCs appointed the first female editor of their newsletter, the outgoing editor Mike Stoten wrote a gloriously patronising letter to branch members. "Gillian Welch, our charming new Lady Chairman . . . has taken on this most important job with apparent calm, but we feel sure that she must have had a few misgivings about taking what is, after all, a very responsible job."

Nevertheless, the YCs did offer middle-class girls social opportunities and a role in the community beyond the home and family. One female member of the Ealing YCs felt moved to write an open letter to sister members about how to manage their clothing bill for the myriad social occasions they were expected to attend: "What other ‘club' caters for varying interests such as tennis (whites, of course), swimming, boating and rambling (thick sweaters and trousers)?" she asked. "One has to dress appropriately for visits to theatres, cinemas, gas-works, art galleries and other places of interest. Another big clothes item are dresses suitable for the many dances we attend. Also stockings worn at dances, often laddered by male clod-hoppers or female stilettos."

This arsenal of outfits was by no means wasted on the male clod-hoppers. Sir Julian Critchley, who was chairman of the Hampstead YCs from 1949 to 1950, wrote nostalgically in later life of those very same tennis whites.