Ray Franz, in his book ‘Crisis of Conscience’ provides some information about this. At page 255 he says that in the 1940s the ‘view held’ was that the generation referred to a period of 30 to 40 years and publications referred to the generation time period as having begun in 1914. He says that this led to the insistence of the time left being extremely short.
Then at the start of the 1950s, the time period had elapsed and a new teaching was required. This occurred in the
Watchtower 1952 1st September and the QFR is quoted in full -
“● Your publications point out that the battle of Armageddon will come in this generation, and that this generation began A.D. 1914. Scripturally, how long is a generation?—G. P., Liberia.
Webster’s unabridged dictionary gives, in part, this definition of generation: “The average lifetime of man, or the ordinary period of time at which one rank follows another, or father is succeeded by child; an age. A generation is usually taken to be about 33 years.” But the Bible is not so specific. It gives no number of years for a generation. And in Matthew 24:34, Mark 13:30 and Luke 21:32, the texts mentioning the generation the question refers to, we are not to take generation as meaning the average time for one generation to be succeeded by the next, as Webster’s does in its 33-year approximation; but rather more like Webster’s first-quoted definition, “the average lifetime of man.” Three or even four generations may be living at the same time, their lives overlapping. (Ps. 78:4; 145:4) Before the Noachian flood the life span was hundreds of years. Down through the centuries since, it has varied, and even now is different in different countries. The Bible does speak of a man’s days as being threescore and ten or fourscore years; but it assigns no specific number of years to a generation.—Ps. 90:10.
Even if it did, we could not calculate from such a figure the date of Armageddon, for the texts here under discussion do not say God’s battle comes right at the end of this generation, but before its end. To try to say how many years before its end would be speculative. The texts merely set a limit that is sufficiently definite for all present practical purposes. Some persons living A.D. 1914 when the series of foretold events began will also be living when the series ends with Armageddon. All the events will come within the span of a generation. There are hundreds of millions of persons living now that were living in 1914, and many millions of these persons could yet live a score or more years. Just when the lives of the majority of them will be cut short by Armageddon we cannot say.”
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Splane doesn’t say when the Sister wrote her letter, it could be possible that it was before this article or that she missed the New Light or was one of the few JWs who was still hanging onto the old teaching and making Splanes claim that there were only a few who believed 1954 would see the end at that time. It seems pretty much like the idea that some JWs were still holding into the idea that ‘this generation’ still meant within a persons lifetime, even though the GB had changed its meaning in the 1990s.
But it is interesting that the GB are once again making a mockery of their followers and blaming them for a teaching that they invented. Splane also chooses to use an example of a Sister who was then believing in something the Watchtower no longer taught but if she was up with their current teaching, at that time, it would prove to be just as absurd.
