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Corsetry for ChildrenThe 20th century |
When the century opened many mothers still put their daughters into corset waists while they were quite young, and as they grew they progressed to adult corsets. The garment on the right is a fearsome example of what quite young girls were expected to wear. It is made from grey sateen and lined with grey cotton. It has a button front fastening and double elastic lacing at the back, and is shaped by twenty-two whalebone supports, with further support provided by flat steels at the centre of the front and back. In 1908 Symingtons introduced the Liberty Bodice, which rapidly replaced these more formidable corset bodices. I have not been able to find much information about what children wore in the first half of the century, but it seems probable that, at least up to the 1914-18 war, and sometimes even up to the 60's, they would have continued to wear liberty bodices until they were ready to move on to adult underwear. Strictly speaking, Liberty Bodice was a trademark of the Symington Corsetry Company, but it came to be applied to any garment of this general type.
The illustrations on the left are also from the Symington collection. They show the original Liberty Bodice from 1908. According to the article on the website, it was made from an unbleached knitted cotton fabric, was fastened with 9 bone buttons, was intended for girls from 9 to 13, and cost one and nine pence halfpenny. It is fastened at the back, and the wearer would probably have found it almost impossible to put on, or remove, by herself. My reading suggests that in winter it was fairly standard wear for girls, and often also for boys, from about 4 until puberty. It would certainly have been less uncomfortable than the preceding heavily boned corset bodices, but could have been quite constricting, especially if, as one writer has suggested, it was fitted when the child was small, and not adjusted as she grew so that it got progressively tighter. Whatever the case, it seems to have been heartily detested by most children.
After the 1914-18 war there was a general relaxation of standards, and new lightweight elastic fabrics began to become available. In the 1920s Girdles replaced Corsets for the younger woman, and were in turn replaced in the Thirties by Roll-ons. Suspender belts were also introduced in the twenties, and rapidly gained in popularity. So (at least in Britain) it is probable that a prewar schoolgirls first foundation garment would have been either a suspender belt or a roll-on to hold up their stockings, which would probably have been part of their school uniform when they moved to secondary school. I gather that they would have got their first bra when their breasts started to become obvious. Girls developed more slowly then, and this would probably have occurred somewhere between 14 and 16.
As far as I can gather this continued to be the situation in Britain after the war. It would also have applied in private schools in Australia, where stockings were usually part of a girls uniform, but in State high schools stockings were usually optional or even forbidden. Australian girls generally didn't start dating until after they had left school, and girls who went to high schools probably didn't start wearing stockings until they went to university, or started work. They probably also got their first bras when there was something for them to support. However in America girls were much more socially advanced, and dating took up a considerable part of their spare time once they reached secondary School. Children did not usually wear school uniforms, and girls usually wore much more mature clothing than their counterparts in Britain and Australia. They usually moved into girdles and stockings at about 12. Many girls regarded the acquisition of a girdle as an important milestone on the route to adulthood, and eagerly looked forward to their first girdle. Very often they would get this for the Easter church services, which were a major event in the family social calendar, or for their Confirmation. Many waited equally anxiously for their first bra, but usually acquired this somewhat later, when their breasts started to show the first signs of developing. In the Fifties and Sixties teenagers in the States had far more disposable income than any previous generation of children, or children anywhere else, and manufacturers did everything they could to encourage the girls to spend theirs on underwear. They introduced ranges of teen and even preteen bras and girdles, which they advertised heavily on television and in the girls magazines. This Warners ad, with its mixture of surprised innocence and sophisticated glamour, is typical of the advertising of the period. It appeared in a Canadian magazine in spring 1966. |
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The Art of Corsetry Ed: Bunyip Bluegum |
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b. Back view
