50s, fashions, lifestyle

Phoenix--

I had a pregnant cousin who insisted on wearing a Merry Widow to fit into her Matron of Honor costume. At the wedding reception she fainted in her soup.

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Just started reading David Halberstam's account of the 1950s: a must read!

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farmerman wrote:

In 1958, I was 8 and had to wear corduroy pants. I hate corduroy, people heard you comin from half a mile away.

Corduroy! Wow, now there's something I haven't thought about in a million years! Those pants used to wear out in strange places! Laughing

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Whats a Merry Widow?

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click here

Here is a merry widow.

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goodfielder wrote:

Donna Reed - for mine she was the quintessential 50s woman :wink:

For me too Laughing

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Reyn wrote:

farmerman wrote:
In 1958, I was 8 and had to wear corduroy pants. I hate corduroy, people heard you comin from half a mile away.

Corduroy! Wow, now there's something I haven't thought about in a million years! Those pants used to wear out in strange places!

Corduroy was for rich kids. We wore jeans with turned up cuffs and those old hightop black & white running shoes that cost about $1.50 and you wore them until your socks got wet from the rain.

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http://groups.msn.com/_Secure/0VAAAAHMbSb2D6ydztzqeTTpzAIqpK0*BTIgbKJim41wUOSanTwvLVen*aMRtuwrLNb3G9*n7lIvn4UAnigqxiAfU8euifZv!nFU7OuLeN4bSHYwiY7Ex694nkqpjATwN/corset.jpg

When I was a kid, I had a rather portly aunt. We went shopping together, and she bought a corset like the picture above. She got it at the "corsetiere". That was a store that sold only bras and girdles. The saleswomen were specially trained to fit women properly. If you think that Victoria's Secret is a latter day version of the "corsetiere"...............................well, it isn't!

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Pink and black... I don't remember clothes in pink and black, but I remember a car - De Soto - that was primarily pink but might have had some black. I'd guess 1955.

We used to wear panty girdles. I seem to remember the tops rolling into a coiled band if you sat down. Like much else in life, being free of constriction is especially pleasant if one has undergone the constriction in the first place.

Also remember the girdles of whatever level of constriction served to keep flesh from jiggling, then an important matter for modesty. Modesty, now there's a word I haven't heard in a while.

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Cordoroy was for rich kids? You wore jeans? Jeans were forbidden at both the Catholic and public schools in our community.

Pink and black, or, the more popular pink and grey, were everywhere as was turquoise and bright orange. Saddle shoes were worn with poodle skirts and pullover sweaters with little lace collars. White poplin jackets were the uniform in spring but my mother always bought me navy blue ones. The rich kids wore Pat Boones white suede shoes and had little bags of chalk to keep them white.

The nuns raged against the belt buckles at the back of pants as they thought they scratched the desks.

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the comic strip Gasoline Alley devoted an entire Sunday to the color combination pink and grey because it was so popular.

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plainoldme wrote:

Cordoroy was for rich kids? You wore jeans? Jeans were forbidden at both the Catholic and public schools in our community.

Pink and black, or, the more popular pink and grey, were everywhere as was turquoise and bright orange. Saddle shoes were worn with poodle skirts and pullover sweaters with little lace collars. White poplin jackets were the uniform in spring but my mother always bought me navy blue ones. The rich kids wore Pat Boones white suede shoes and had little bags of chalk to keep them white.

The nuns raged against the belt buckles at the back of pants as they thought they scratched the desks.

I am not Catholic and the public school I went to was in Canada <not sure if that makes a difference>. :-)

I remember those poodle skirts. A lot of the girls wore them while we wore our rolled up cuff jeans.

I remember the Black Diamond Rider Motorcycle Club in Toronto and oh, yeah just remember...The Paradise Riders was a rival gang.

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I remember changing clothes after mass on sunday and getting into my blue jeans while still wearing my nylons and then slipping into what I now recognize as a classic pair of fairly homely sandals from Clarks, though I think mine were from a cheapo place like Leed's. Not sure if Leed's was the shoe store in Evanston, or just in LA when we moved there when I was thirteen. In any case, I remember an inchoate feeling of pleasure wearing the jeans over my nylons. I was so damned naive, it's hard to describe how naive I was. But, I remember the good sense of self. That would have been '54.

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As long as you felt good about it . . .

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Yes, it sounds like a small moment and it was, but it was a good introduction to adult sensuality.

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No good moment is small.

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So, that was in '54. I also remember not being able to wear slacks/pants to school, not to mention jeans, in 1961, when I took trig at our local city college in summer school.

Bigggggg change from 61 to, say, 67.

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I graduated from a woman's college in 1969 and we couldn't wear pants of any kind to class ever although dorm students could wear them inside their dorm buildings. My aunt who graduated from Miami of Ohio in 1964 said girls could only wear pants (but not jeans) if they had a painting class or a chemistry class.

I remember in 1970 when Jacobson's, Michigan's late, lamented high fashion dept store, allowed its employees to wear pant suits to work.

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Hmmm, so I was ahead of the game back in '54. I'm sure I wasn't the only one with jeans among my girlfriends. Maybe we were in a bubble of innovation.

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My mother accepted blue jeans for camping and gardening, but strongly disapproved of them being worn anywhere else. In the mid-90's when she'd been diagnosed with terminal cancer she asked me not to wear blue jeans to the hospital.

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