Old School Children's Books and the Parenting Styles they Reveal

I've been reading The Happy Hollisters to LMS, and as I did so, I realized some things. The Happy Hollisters series was written in the 50s and 60s, and you can tell the difference in what the children do versus what children do in books written more recently. We've listened to several other books that were also written quite some time ago, and the difference can be seen in them as well.  Gone-Away Lake was written in 1957, the first Betsy-Tacy book was written in 1940, and My Side of the Mountain was written in 1959.

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The Happy Hollisters- The kids wander around town (theirs and those they visit) without their parents worrying about them- as long as they make it home for meals, they're good. Despite the fact that each story has a mystery in it and bad people, the kids accept rides from strangers they just met. Perhaps because the bad guys don't really hide that they're bad? Bullies do mean things that would get them thrown in juvie these days.

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Gone-Away Lake- Again, the kids wander around, completely free, only returning home for dinner. In this book, they make friends with an elderly woman and her brother and then keep it a secret from their parents. They explore deserted houses and make one their clubhouse.

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Betsy-Tacy- The girls have the run of their neighborhood and again, only return home for meals.

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My Side of the  Mountain- Sam (14 years old, I believe) leaves his large family's crowded city apartment to go live in a hollow tree on a mountain. He learns all sorts of things about being alone and surviving in the wild.

The main thing that jumps out to me is that none of these kids had parents hovering over them. Have you read Free Range Kids, How to Raise Safe, Self-Reliant Children (Without Going Nuts with Worry)? I read it awhile ago and started writing a post that will eventually get finished and posted :).

I will admit to being a helicopter parent who's working on reforming. I blame our fertility issues and LMS being an only child for so long: it made me more protective than I probably would have been otherwise. As such, I found Free Range Kids a very interesting read. It definitely opened my eyes to how much many parenting styles have changed in the last generation. Reading these old books reinforces the idea that things have indeed changed.

Have you read any older books that show a difference in parenting styles or expectations?