Novelty Bathing Caps – 1960s

One of the greatest things about studying fashion history is that there is always something new to discover. Just when you think you have seen it all from an era, something like the swim cap above pops into your etsy  suggestions. Yes, this is a bathing cap, made from acrylic yarn fused to a rubber base.

For those of you not around in the 1960s, bathing caps were on their way out, but archaic rules about women’s hair made them mandatory in many public pools. I can remember that my public pool had such a rule, but as men’s hair grew longer in the mid 60s, we began ignoring it. After all, many of the boys had hair longer than that of some girls. There was no big protest, but the caps quickly disappeared after about 1964.

I was hoping to find an ad for this pigtail cap, as there is a brand name – Cole of California – in the cap. Unfortunately, I came up empty, so I decided to think about style. When were pigtails fashionable? It seems odd that any adult would put little girl braids in her hair, but in the time of little girl looks, also known as the mid 1960s, pretty much anything youthful went. I wore my hair in pigtails, and not when I was seven. I was probably around twelve, now that I think about it.

So starting with the year 1967, the year I turned twelve, I did some research. To be honest, I spent a few pleasurable hours looking through 1967 and 68 Seventeen, Teen, and Glamour magazines. What I discovered was that 1967 does seem to be the year of the pigtail. I found examples in all three magazines, and the December, 1967 Glamour even had a young woman in pigtails on the cover. So I feel pretty confident in dating this cap to 1967.

Here is how the yarn is attached to the rubber. There are no stitches in the rubber. This is more like a rubber thread that is fused on the cap to hold the yarn in place.

Cole advertised in the major fashion magazines, so I’m holding out hope that original ad can be found.

The second cap is just as interesting, but in a more sophisticated manner. If you are one of those persons who feels naked when not wearing earrings, this is the cap for you.

I’ve seen swim caps that were molded to look like hair in catalogs and ads as far back as the 1930s. This one is newer, but when exactly? The biggest clues are the earrings. At first glance I’d be tempted to say 1970s, but by then the swim cap was pretty much over except in pools in retirement villages in Florida. So when were dangly earrings popular?

I found lots of long earrings around 1962 and 1963. Could that be when this cap was made? I’m not nearly as confident in dating this one.

Here’s a close-up of the earrings. The dangles are little fake coins. And look at how they are attached. It has to be some kind of miracle that this survived intact. I’m guessing that it wasn’t worn very much. Maybe it was just too outré.

Unfortunately there is no maker’s imprint. To be honest, this looks to me to be the type of thing that was advertised in the cheap ads in the backs of fashion magazines. Maybe this came from the swim cap equivalent of Frederick’s of Hollywood.

As always, your opinions are welcomed and appreciated.

1960s Kleinert’s Beach Bags

Things seem to come in bunches, as I recently found two really great Kleinert’s beach bags from the 1960s. Kleinert’s was/is a maker of rubber products, and so was a big player in the swim accessories market. I’ll share more about the company at the end of this post.

The bag above is canvas that has a layer of rubber fused to it. You can see it on the left along with the label. This bag dates to 1963.

I can say that with certainty as I found it in a catalog from 1963. In the description it is mentioned that the bag was also available in black, white, and tan.

The second bag is, according to my guess, a bit older, and may possibly date from the late 1950s. I love the design of this one, and the fact that it was never used and still has the hangtag.

When not in use, this bag stores flat. When being used, it takes the shape of a diamond.

The tag had a great late 50s or early 60s look. When was orange combined with pink hip? That might help nail down the date on this one.

This bag has the same label (with the addition of the copyright symbol) and the same rubber lining as the 1963 duffel. It looks like the rubber is degrading, but that is actually the original cardboard liner.

The following history is copied from a post I wrote in 2011.

Kleinert’s was started in 1869 as I.B. Kleinert’s Rubber Company .  The owner,  Isaak Kleinert, started the company to produce his many inventions, all consisting at least in part of rubber.   The company’s fortune seems to have been made on the dress shield, little rubber crescents, covered with cotton, that were basted into the underarms of one’s frocks.  In the days before antiperspirants, these little shields saved many dresses from ruin, and many misses from embarrassment!  I’ve found many vintage dresses with the dress shields still in place.

But Kleinert’s was not just about dress shields.  According to the Kleinert’s website, Isaak Kleinert also invented the shower cap, rubber baby pants, and the shower curtain.  For many years they also made rubber swim accessories, such as bathing caps, shoes and totes.  They even produced a limited line of swimsuits.  I’ve seen Kleinert’s ads for rubber-lined swim caps as early as the 1910s, and they were made at least into the 1960s.  But by the 1970s, the swim cap was old-fashioned, and rarely worn except by grandmas and competitive swimmers.

This business is still in operation, still making shields and other moisture protection products.  And, quite nicely, still made in the USA.

Update: I found a reference to pink and orange in Claire McCardell’s 1956 book, What Shall I Wear? “I have discovered the excitement of orange and pink… Granted that orange and pink may be too bold for a drawing room in midwinter. But what about wearing it to a resort? I am sure you will find that the two colors fade into harmony in the Mediterranean sun.””

 

1960s Alfred Shaheen Pants Set

The Alfred Shaheen name is very familiar to vintage clothing collectors, especially those who love the sun dresses and bathing suits of the 1950s. The business was based in Hawaii, where Shaheen expanded his father’s clothing manufacturing business in the post WWII period, capitalizing on the new fad for Hawaiian shirts.

From my little history at the VFG Label Resource:

At first he used fabrics brought in from the US mainland, but he soon realized that profits would be greater if he printed the fabric in Hawaii. He set up Surf ‘n Sand Hand Prints to print the colorful Hawaiian fabrics. His handprinted textiles were based on the flora and fauna of the Hawaiian Islands, along with Hawaiian traditions and authentic tapa cloth designs.

Shaheen produced not only the fabric, but they also manufactured clothing made from it. Shaheen was known for their sexy sarong dresses and swim suits, Hawaiian shirts and halter dresses with full skirts. The company closed in 1988 when Alfred Shaheen retired.

Shaheen not only used Hawaiian themes; the design studio was also was inspired by the rich multicultural population of post war Hawaii. Even the label took on a decidedly “exotic” look.

The set looks, at first glance, to be from the 1950s. I think we can all see Lucy Ricardo wearing this for casual entertaining. But the label is one that is most commonly seen in the 1960s. To confirm the date, the pants have a nylon coil zipper, which was introduced to the American market in the early 1960s.

The pants legs are very interesting. In 1960 pants were still tapered to the ankle, but then they became straight before blooming into bell-shaped legs in the late 60s. Without the pleat my pants are very straight, but the presence of the pleat sure does hint of things to come.

The collar, too, seems to predict the short-lived fad for the Nehru collar in the late 60s. But in this case I’m guessing it was just the company’s love of the “exotic” that led them to use a collar that is more associated with India than Hawaii.

Even though permanently attached care instructions were not mandated by law in the USA until 1972, the presence of a label like the one above does not mean the garment was made after 1972. Many manufacturers were already sewing simple care labels like the one in my pants long before the law went into effect.

You may have noticed the wonderful condition of this set. I can only imagine that it was bought by a woman who was under the spell of her tropical surroundings, and that when she returned home to Tennessee, the set was just too, well, exotic.

 

Vintage Miscellany – June 25, 2017

Judging by the length of the skirts, this is probably 1926 or 27. That mid-knee length on the younger woman is about as short as it got in the Twenties. Her whole outfit is great, but I especially love the rolled stockings. Or maybe it’s the polka dot headband that I love best. It’s hard to decide.

There’s lots of news, so let’s move on to it.

• •   As a teacher, my colleagues and I often said our jobs were making us crazy. We might have been exaggerating a bit, but in the 1930s it was discovered that workers making rayon were experiencing high instances of mental disorders. 
  • Today, the dangers of manufacturing rayon continue.
  • As so many companies out-source the manufacturing of goods, the companies themselves often don’t have a clue as to conditions in the factories that make their goods. That’s a pretty valid reason for reshoring clothing and shoe manufacturing, especially when it allows companies like American Giant to keep a close eye on the entire process. And yes, this does come at a price to consumers.
  • Remember Dexter shoes? They were made in Dexter, Maine until the company closed (due to foreign competition) in 2001. Now a new shoe company has opened in Dexter, and again, American-made comes at a price.
  •  Is there any way to reduce all the waste we are producing? Can we limit the amount of garbage in the world through the products we buy? How about these shoes?
  •  Here’s a true story of an eight year old girl who in 1835 was saved from a stabbing because of her corset.
  •  When things get political, can a clothing company stay out of politics?
  • Or maybe they should just stop pretending and sell to the “resistance”.
  • Leather goods maker Mark Cross has a long and interesting history.  Established in 1845 as a maker of horse accessories, the company was bought by the Murphy family in 1875. The company eventually fell to Gerald Murphy who, along with his wife Sara, was part of the 1920s American ex-pats in Paris set that included Hemingway and Fitzgerald and Cole Porter. And probably best known of all Mark Cross facts is that Grace Kelly carried her nightie to James Stewart’s apartment in the 1954 film, Rear Window. Eventually the company closed, only to now be revived. Their biggest success is a bag called the Kelly, modeled after the case Grace carried in the movie.
  • People keep posting photos of their visits to the Brooklyn Museum to see the Georgia O’keeffe: Living Modern exhibition. I loved this article about the exhibition in The New Yorker.

For those of you wondering when I’d go on another rant about social media, the time has come. And for those of you who don’t want to come here to read anything political, then you need to stop and call it a read.

Some of you probably know that I get the great majority of my Vintage Miscellany links from my Twitter feed. For years I’ve found Twitter to be the best source of fashion history and fashion issues articles. But lately (since the election, to be honest) I’ve found myself really hating Twitter. Part of it is my own fault. I started following organizations with which I agree. That led to checking the trending hashtags to see what Trump was shouting from his bully megaphone. That led to reading the comments, which led to a lots of despair about the current status of the human race.

Then, last week, Damon Linker spelled it all out for me in an articled titled “Twitter is Destroying America.” One line in particular made sense, “Twitter is a place, finally, that all-too-often transforms otherwise thoughtful people into a furious mob.”

It is, actually, more than just twitter, as a commenter pointed out. Facebook is no better, and have you ever read the comments of practically any newspaper article? The idea of being able to say anything we want, in a manner that confronts anyone who does not agree with us is now taken as one of our fundamental rights. It’s the First Amendment on amphetamines.

I’ve done a lot of thinking (not a good thing, actually) about our current situation in the USA, and I know why it produces so much anxiety in me. I had a very anxious youth, with the Vietnam War hanging over our heads, and not knowing which of the young men in my high school class would end up there, perhaps as casualties. When I met my husband in 1972, he was still mourning the loss of a childhood friend who had died in Vietnam. And then when it looked like the war was finally going to end, the whole Watergate mess became public.  It dragged on while the country’s business was put on hold. No wonder I have this déjà vu feeling whenever I open my Twitter feed.

But what is really disappointing is how many of my own generation seem to have forgotten what the 1960s and early 70s were really like. When you chant “Make America Great Again” are you thinking about Watergate, or Kent State, or Mỹ Lai, or Medgar Evers?

As Stephen Sills put it, “Nobody’s right, if everybody’s wrong.” It’s time to rethink all the online shouting, of “Hooray for our side.”

1960s Clutch Wallet with a Strap

I’m hoping that my somewhat vague title brought forth a distinct memory in any Baby Boomer readers.  That’s because this post is a bit of a memory check for me.  When I was a young teen, or maybe even a preteen in the late 1960s, the little bag shown above was carried by every girl in my town.  I don’t know how fads get started, but I do know how quickly they can spread.  By the time this one died out, all my peers had one.  Mine was black “patent leather”.

I remember getting it for Christmas, but I just can’t come up with a year.  I’m guessing it was sometime between fifth and eight grade, which would mean from 1966 to 1969.  Growing up in a small town in North Carolina, girls were always lamenting that we were at least two years behind the times.  That was true in some cases, but looking back I can see that for the most part the clothes we wore were pretty much in keeping with the styles of the day, if a bit more conservative.

After finding the little clutch bag above in a local antique mall, I spent a good afternoon doing “research” in my stash of 1960s Seventeen magazines.  I thought that would be the place to start, as this was a fashion I associated with the young.  In spite of the overwhelming practical nature of this type bag, the only people I remember carrying them were girls and teens.  It didn’t seem to appeal to our mothers.

But I was not able to find a single photo in Seventeen, so I turned to that great American selling place of the past – the Sears, Roebuck catalog.  I have several editions, dating from 1964 through 1970, and so another afternoon was pleasantly passed.  Unfortunately, I was again unsuccessful in my quest.

So, I’ve decided to turn to you.  Do you remember this type bag, and if so, what years do you associate with it?  Did you have one in the 1960s?  Were they a fad at your school?  Do you remember what it was called?

Here’s a look inside.  There is a snap purse with a clear vinyl separator.  The sides are lined with a cotton print that looks a bit dated even for 1965, but the magazines and catalogs for that year are surprisingly full of dresses made of this type print.  There is no label of any sort.

Each side has a pocket for cash and papers.  The strap is attached to the purse in the center of the bag.

Considering how popular these were, I’ve run across only two in the past fifteen years or so.  I didn’t buy the first one I found so many years ago, mainly because I thought there must be thousands of these just waiting to be found.  When that turned out not to be true, I put this style on my shopping list.  It made me happy that the one I finally did find was such a bright, cheery color.

So what has happened to all these little bags?  It could be that my experience with them is not usual, and there are literally millions of them in thrift stores across the country.  Or it could be that when the fad had run its course, these went into the donate for charity pile.  They were cheaply made, and no longer in style.  I can almost guarantee that is what happened to mine.

1960s Beach Bag That Might Be from Coppertone

If you were around in the 1950s and 60s then you probably are familiar with the Coppertone Suntan Lotion slogan, “Don’t Be A Paleface!”  Billboards and magazine ads showed the little girl with her tan line being exposed by an enthusiastic spaniel.  I recently ran across this beach bag, and immediately thought it was a Coppertone item, probably a premium of some type.

On closer examination though, the word “Coppertone” is nowhere to be seen, though there is a bit of a copyright symbol at the bottom of the girl’s right foot.

Weirder still is the image on the other side of the bag.  It shows a woman in a rather modest bikini, and a very exuberant man in matching trunks.  Still no Coppertone logo, though there is a little bottle of suntan lotion on the blanket.

It does look a lot like a Coppertone bottle.

To add to the mystery, there is another version of this bag that does have the word “Coppertone”, and that was somehow associated with the Olympics.  The bag does not reveal the year, but I’m guessing 1964 or 1968.

Since I bought this, I’ve seen ones like it for sale online, and the listings all use the Coppertone connection.  The ad and image were so well-known, that maybe the actual word “Coppertone” was thought to be unnecessary.

Note the squirrel photo-bombing my first photo.

Mohair Sweater, Circa 1960

My first fashion history teacher was my mother.  In telling me about the clothes she wore as a young woman in the 1940s, I became fascinated with how clothing styles changed and how they reflected the times in which the wearers lived.  I’ve always loved stories about women and the clothes that have been important to them.

While I was young, I witnessed two major changes in the the way women dressed – the switch from the conservative styles of the early 1960s to the Mod styles of the mid 60s, and then from the Mod styles to the 1970s which brought about a greater acceptance of women wearing pants and a more eclectic way of dressing overall.

Growing up in a small town in the mountains of North Carolina, I was made aware at an early age that fashion as seen in magazines and on television was not always what was being worn in my community.  The girls I knew always complained that we were at least two years behind the rest of the country, but looking back I realize that it wasn’t just this area that suffered a fashion lag.  What woman or girl in the 1960s could afford to replace all her clothing every season?  And so wardrobes were made more stylish as clothing was replaced or altered.

One garment I recall from my childhood was the bulky mohair sweater.  Whenever I come across one of these sweaters, I’m instantly reminded of my older cousin Nancy and the other high school girls who rode my school bus.  All these teens were wearing mohair sweaters in the early 60s, but by the time I would have wanted one, they were no longer the style.  I estimate that the girls I knew were wearing them in the early 1960s, and my search for images confirms that this was the era in which they were popular.  The latest image I found was in a 1965 Montgomery Ward catalog.

Like most of these sweaters that I’ve seen, the catalog states that this one was made in Italy of a blend of mohair, wool, and nylon.

I’d love to hear any memories you might have of wearing mohair.  Please tell me how itchy it was so I can get over this sense of loss at never getting to wear it as a child.