Fashion History Query: St. Louis and Style Piracy

G

Graham Phillips

Registered Guest
Hi everyone,

I'm a law student doing research for a professor who's interested in fashion law and I'm trying to learn all I can about an obscure corner of history, namely the anti-style piracy efforts undertaken by the St. Louis fashion industry in the 1930s - 40s (- 50s?). I was drawn to this site and forum because I discovered some older posts that gave me some helpful leads. If there's anyone out there with an interest in the history of style piracy who'd be willing to give me any advice or resources, I'd appreciate it tremendously. I'd also be happy to explain what I've been able to learn thus far, if that would be helpful.

Thanks very much,
Graham

PS - Moderators, if I've put this thread in an inappropriate place, let me know and I'll happily relocate it.
 
Do you mean the Fashion Originator's Guild of America? Because that was based in New York. St. Louis was a centre of production for shoes and junior's clothing, and there is a lot of labour history in the St. Louis manufacturing plants (strikes etc.) but I'm not aware of any attempts to curb style piracy in St. Louis during the 1930s/40s.
 
The research I'm doing is an off-shoot of a project that is primarily focused on FOGA. The St. Louis anti-piracy movement I'm interested in was a sort of joint venture between the Associated Garment Industries of St. Louis and the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union. There was a reasonable amount of press coverage of its inception in 1937 (e.g., this article), but I'm having difficulty tracking down many details of its operation or its end.
 
Have you tried the Newspaper Archives? I think you can get a trial subscription - not sure. Also NYTimes archives? (Might have to pay for the full article.)
 
Linn, I have read that article, but thank you nonetheless! That article pointed me to a handy primary source article from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. In theory I think the two most potentially helpful sources would be the Post-Dispatch and Women's Wear Daily (which did have another good article covering the creation of the agreement), but unfortunately neither of those sources has been thoroughly indexed for the relevant time period. I'd love it if anyone knew of an entire book devoted to the St. Louis garment industry, but I can't seem to find anything that looks promising.
 
Trust me, there is no book on the St. Louis garment industry... The manufacturers are all gone and there is no memory and little money in that city to publish a history. I bet there is a ton of corporate records in the city archives. Also, have you checked to see if any of the universities have dissertations on aspects of labour history/industrial history where that might have been researched?
 
I do know that Kansas City Mo has a garment district museum - have you been in touch with them? It's the other side of the state, but chances are there was some cross over.
 
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