Horrible, ill-dressed, spike-shoed American women

lkranieri

lkranieri

VFG Member
From a 1945 WWII newsletter that went to men stationed on the remote Aleutian island of Amchitka...

DurationDailyFashion1945Web.jpg
 
Very interesting, thanks for sharing! This is pretty bad but some of the advertising at the time is even worse. I honestly have no idea how women at the time could stand this attitude. The douche ads are the absolute worst - you'd think women would have boycotted a product now and then to send the message.
 
Wow! Rita's right that there's real misogyny at work here... maybe part of the post-war trend to get all the ex-Rosie the Riveters to let men take the center stage again? I remember reading Elizabeth Hawes' "Anything but Love", which was published in 1948 and addresses the same issue, but as an advocate for women!

"Like something Salvador Dali might muster up after a midnight snack of welsh rabbit and raw onion"--sheesh! Not even sure what that means (indigestion leading to weirder/darker imagery than usual?), but it's sure designed to make women feel less t han attractive, isn't it?

Thanks for posting, Lynne--very interesting...
 
It sounds like Betty Grable's hairstyle was one of the ones singled out for vitriol - never mind that women were styling their hair for practicality's sake so it didn't get caught in the factory machinery.

Yes, real misogyny. Apparently our only function is a decorative one.
 
This is funny as I was just talking last night to my honey and asking what in the world men must think about women. They change their hairstyles constantly and their dress. Now I know at least what one man thought.
Does anyone know what led to the broad shoulders in the 40s for women or 80s fashion for that matter?
 
Thanks, Lynn!

What I found most interesting was the editor's comment to "keep it clean." The mere SUGGESTION of pregnancy was considered racy. Why this guy's particular preferences in women's haberdashery should be the topic of a printed news article is beyond me. So he doesn't like padded shoulders and peplums? Big whoop.

But is it any more misogynistic than what you see on the racks at today's checkout stands? We've become more subtle in delivering the message that a woman's "true purpose" is the visual and sexual satisfaction of men, but no less insidious.
 
The writer of this article worked for the New York World-Telegram, which was a right-wingnut newspaper - the period equivalent of Fox News. I found several articles by a woman writer for that newspaper in the 1960s who was on a personal crusade to make hat-wearing the responsibility of god-fearing Christian women, and that any woman who didn't wear a hat was essentially a Bolshevik Beatnik.
 
She had several articles where she 'outed' society women who were seen dining without a hat, including editors of Vogue magazine! The abandonment of hats was part of the 'world going to hell in a handcart' argument of the mid 1960s - a symptom of the times, along with hippies, drugs, and miniskirts.
 
Fascinating. It is amazing to me how much we are so like puppets and easily manipulated. I wonder at what point if it could be found out where we stopped being individuals using our own minds. I could chat about this for hours.
A few years back the Smithsonian had a whole wing showing how propaganda was used like Rosie the Riveter to push women out to the workforce and Leave it to Beaver to push women back home.
I recently watched the Women in History series. Slanted but informative.
I have tons of 50sm 60s and earlier magazines. Loads of info but one never really knows what the slant is by the author of the time. Of course time changes ideas, information. I think if someone repeats something enough it starts becoming truth whether or not it is. Social media for that reason is a bit daunting to me. Like some new kind of tool with a million gadgets never tested before. No telling where we will end up. Brings to mind the Post Office game we played as children. One person tells someone something and by the time it gets back around it is a completely different message.
So technically it could possibly be seen a conservative lady ended hats by creating a backlash?
Maybe someone should start a personal crusade to bring hats back.
 
I have a magazine where an article is "Professional Housewife."
I also have a Life 1971 magazine with Germaine Greer on cover. "Saucy Feminist that Even Men Like."
She states inside: "I don't go for that whole pants and battledress routine. It just puts men off."
 
Germaine Greer was (is) quite racy. My dad went to university with her - she was very popular with men in the '60s and very open about how much she enjoyed them.

I've often thought how hard it must have been for the old guard in the '60s, with the rapid pace of change. No wonder some people felt like it was all going to hell in a...handbag? Is "hand cart" the original part of that saying Jonathan? I've always said "hand bag" :hysterical:
 
I've heard "hell in a hand basket too". The oldest version wins though. Funny how some phrases get adapted, and others remain in their pure form.

The idea of going to hell in anything is rather funny - something tells me that transport is provided.
 
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