Cork wedge heels, shorter hemlines, and glow in the dark buttons. Friends of the National World war ii memorial hosted this talk as a part of their annual teachers conference. Irene winchester talk about so we are excited to invite Becky Morrison and Irene Winchester talk about fashion rationing during world war ii. She brought another teacher from her school. Please join me in welcoming them up for their presentation. [applause] Becky Morrison she stole my line because i was going to say, this is probably the best teacher conference you can ever go to. That is why i brought irene. This is my third year. I want you guys to go back to your school and encourage all of your teacher friends to come because this is such a valuable conference. Thank you friends of the world war ii memorial for inviting me back. Irene and i are going to talk about fashion on the ration. In the United States, we did not ration clothing as much as the british did, but we had some severe restrictions on rationing. One of the things you can see from the powerpoint is 50 of japans exports are fabric and silk. 32 of that comes to the United States. They were our only source of silk. So you can imagine how pearl harbor is going to impact silk. So, in 1942, the United States orderlimitation l85. Want to reduce domestic fabric production by 15 . Obviously we have to help fit our soldiers, so this is one of the things we talk about with the kids. They cant imagine not being able to go to the mall and buy whatever they want. And also, when we get the shoes, the kids lose their minds. Even my own teenage son, shoes are a big deal. And so, that will come in a little bit later. I dont think the manufacturers for blackmarket stuff, i dont that there was a lot of that, because there were heavy fines for manufacturers that did not follow the rules. So women in the United States, her dress restrictions. This is funny because in every word you see different innovations, food, fashion. Lad emlines get shorter, ies. You actually have angles now and maybe even knees. Ladies hemlines came up a little bit. The fashion and irene will talk more about utility fashion it is really important for women, even during world war ii, that they look good but they are trying to do it in a way that is limiting the amount of material they are using. So you can see 72 inches for dresses, 25 inches for skirts. Your pants had to be tapered. And of course the hems, and things you cant have at all. Coat with a double yolk. They were all banned as luxuries in the United States. Shoes, starting in 1943, because of leather and rubber shortages and those supplies going to the war effort, everybody got three coupons for a year for shoes. And so, i know that might sound like a lot, but think about how many pairs of shoes you might buy a year, how many pairs of shoes your teenager might buy in a year, and that kinds of hits home. If you lost your shoes in a flood or fire, you can get extra. If you are a mailman or a police officer, you could get extra coupons for your shoes. But besides that, you are limited to three. In your shoes, no two toned shoes. Were four colors, black, white, brown, md army brown which is more like brownish green. So not only are we limiting the number of shoes you get, we are limiting the style and color of shoes you can get. So ladies, you dont have a different pair of shoes for every outfit. And then, the opa also banned boots taller than 10 inches and also too much high heels. So we cant have the high heels either. So this is a drag. So, if you had secondhand shoes, didnt have to ration those, and also sears and roebuck will offer you shoes that are nonleather for other coupons. So i guess you could turn in coupon to sears and roebuck and get cork shoes or wedge shoes. We talked about cork the other day. This was cork heels come into fashion because we dont have the leather. Cork heels became a big deal and you can see on the flyer there are a couple of cork shoes. Ladies, we still need to look good and so we still need to have pantyhose. Silk and nylon, they were used for parachutes, powder bags. The opm seized the raw silk in 1941 in the United States. It was august 2, 1941, before pearl harbor. And so, ladies, what to do . I think on the blackmarket you probably could pirate stockings because they went from 1. 25 to more than 10 a pair. That is an 800 increase in the price of a stockings. So, if you are a blackmarket dealer, that might be an industry to get into. Ladies came up with very innovative ways to make it look like they still were wearing nylons. I dont know if you know in the 1930s and 1940s, nylons for women lots of times had a seam up the back. And so what you would do is you would paint your legs with gravy. Hopefully there are not dogs around that are going to lick your leg. So you paint your legs with gravy. They even came up with devices that you could put on your leg and draw with paint up the back of your legs so it would stay straight to make it look like from far away that you actually had nylons with a fashionable seem up the back. So, i dont know about you, and they called glamour hose. I dont know if it gets hot and the gravy melts i dont know. It doesnt sound like a good thing to me. He government set up rives to collect damaged stockings and they would fix them or recycle them for the war effort. Now men, no more vests. No more doublebreasted suits, only single breasted suits. The dark black fancy black jacket, they called it the clark gable, that was banned. I superbly think people in d got them. Your lapel size and cuff size and cuffs on pants are restricted as well. The fashion became very standard and not flashy at all. It was not patriotic to wear flashy clothing. The zoot suit, there was a 20 cutback and wall fabric, so if you know what a zoot suit is with the chains come along long coats, and big lapels they were seen as unpatriotic. And so also, there was leg zootrket boot , not bootleg liquor but bootleg zoot suits. There are people who made zoot suits underground. You know about zoot suit riots you should look it up. It is horrible. These boys you know about zoot suit riots in 1943 and the american sailors thought it was unpatriotic that these guys ran around in zoot suits. If you never studied the zoot suit riots, you should look it up. It is really horrible that these boys were taken and i was reading that they even went to a theater where a movie was playing and they stripped the Mexican American boys suits suits and these boys ended up having to run around naked. There were not very Many American sailors arrested for the zoot suit riots, but there were a lot of Mexican American boys that were arrested. It is something to research if you like. It is very interesting. Funny thing in los angeles today, it is still illegal to wear zoot suits. I dont think youre going to get in trouble for that, but it is still a lot law on the books. So irene is going to talk about the u. K. And how they really were rationed with the coupons like karen talked about. Irene winchester in the u. K. , things are very different because of their size and what kind of resources they have available. They introduced something called make do and mend in 1941. They didnt tell anyone it was coming and waited for a bank holiday to announce it. So, fyi, everybody we are rationing clothing. It was a huge surprise for civilians. It does last until march 1949. We tend to think of world war ii ending in 1945, but in Great Britain, they still struggled for a while after the fact. Here are a couple of coupon books you have for clothing. The color coupon you have will let you buy different items of clothing. We will show acute video clip about how you can trade in color coupons for other items as well. So when they started the rationing, each adult was given 66 coupons to use however you saw fit. But there were some major, significant cutbacks in 1945 through 1946, adults were restricted to 24 coupons per year. That really limited what you could purchase. There were some exceptions. If you are a manual worker, you were going to need far more, so you got far more. R gotilian uniform weareer more. Theatrical performers got more for that morale boosting. We researched and we knew the royal family rationed food, but clothing, we are assuming they fit into the diplomat category because there is not a lot of evidence they were rationing clothing during this time. In new mothers, they each got an extra 50 coupons, some was doubling what you had available for you. Activeduty personnel were exempted. They could buy however much clothing they could afford. This is a chart of how the coupons could be spent. You can see the most expensive item are going to be the things that use more fabric. Macintosh, which is a heavy overcoat, raincoats, jackets, blazers all of those things are going to cost quite a bit. But also in equal quantity were was your womens dresses. They were very expensive at 11 coupons and that made things much more difficult for them. You can see they do have different coupon prices for children as well. So the most common things that people were spending coupons on were dresses for women at 11. Stockings were two coupons. So they didnt see quite the increase that we saw in the u. S. Up 800 , but they were still considered a luxury and we saw a lot of women in the u. K. Painting on the lines as well during mens shirt and pants each were eight and womens shoes ran around five coupons and mens shoes at seven. We have a cute video i would like to show you. It was an ad for how to plan your rationing. It was an ad that ran in the 1940s. [video clip] the rationing of clothing mens trousers were cut down but for womens dresses, the numbers of coupons became a problem of the moment. Narrator this is how it all worked out. Narrator total, 66. Men had to do a bit of fiddling. For the same number of coupons, this is what he would get. Total clickety click. , narrator a girl could manage with a hat and a blanket or even hat. Narrator but men would be driven to drink for lack of clothes. See how much she wore. Wasnt she extravagant . Isnt it marvelous . 500. K coat used to cost now i can get it for 14 margarine coupons. [indiscernible] and now [end clip] Irene Winchester my students love the british humor because it is bizarre. [laughter] Irene Winchester it doesnt good job of showing how we came from the overthetop dresses that wouldve cost 48 coupons and now we are going to slim down. When it comes to the kids, kids were also given coupons and the children who fit into what they called the outsize range got 10 extra tickets. That is really a nice way of saying the larger children who might have been overweight they got a little bit of extra. We dont see schools restrict or relaxing on uniforms. They still required students to come in uniforms. So mom, you are going to need to plan ahead because the clothing has to fit him for years to come. And it makes things difficult. We see women working on creating innovative ways of exchanging goods. So the Womens Voluntary Service set up clothing exchanges. It was like a swap. Everybody brought their old stuff and depending on how much of what you brought, or the quality of what you brought, you got points to spend on other peoples secondhand goods. This was one way they worked together to try to figure out a way to prevent your poor little boy from having his short shorts as they showed here. Beyond the rationing of clothing itself, they did also have specifications of what kind of restrictions you had on your clothing. Coats and jackets could have no more than three pockets. Dresses could have two. We do see that we are not going to waste metal on buttons. And something that was interesting the boys cannot wear long pants or trousers until they turn 13. So if we have all the little boys and shorts, that saves fabric and it is still a trend we see. Tail coats, embroidery, braids, lace, all of the extra things are taken away. And for the ladies, on the underwear, nowhere shearing or fancy stitching. We are just getting to the basics. That being said, the way that women looked was incredibly important, especially in the u. K. It was unfashionable to be showy or overthetop fancy, you had to look good. So much so that the slogan became beauty was a duty. Ok. It was your job to look good. Is neverakeup rationed. It does fall under a luxury tax, but it is never rationed. We encourage all of the ladies to look their best because it was a morale booster for the women. Ok, is what they viewed it as. Women would ever feel comfortable if they couldnt go out in public with makeup on. The ministry of supply and the u. K. Said makeup was as important to women as tobacco is to men. And so it was really important for them to keep it that way. This is really significant when we look at what is also axis side. N the in germany, we see a trend for women to be more matronly or motherly. They are not doing a lot of makeup or glamour. So on the u. K. Side, we said we are going to do totally opposite and have all of our girls looking great always and we are going to be different and keep that up. And so women took a lot of pride and effort to look good, even though it is not rationed, makeup is expensive with the luxury tax. So a lot of homemade cosmetics come into play. We see beetroot juice being used as lipstick. And i dont recommend it, but boot polish for mascara. So we are really inventive in the kind of things we are using to make sure we still look good. Becky kind of touched on this utility fashion. With all the new restrictions about what clothing can look like, how do we make it look good . And Great Britain was so concerned about making sure women looked good they commissioned eight designers to create a whole new line of utility clothing that would be appealing. And so some of the fashion is what we think of as iconic 1940s and even some of the early 1950s clothing was paid for by the government to make sure that we were able to buy in, if you will, to this rationing. Here are some more examples of some really classic utility fashion that we see in Great Britain as well as the United States. Repurposing is something that we see and this is happening at home. I have this piece of fabric, what can i make it into now . These are examples that the International War museum in the u. K. Has on display. They have a blanket that they have turned into a cape for a child. Once a blanket has gotten tattered, they can trim it down and reuse it. Remember, coats are some of the most expensive items as far as coupons go. A women skirt suit was made from an old mans used suit. This might be something you had at home or picked up at a swap , but a lot of women are working to redesign fabric or things that they already had. Necessary fashion comes into play a lot in the u. K. With the air raids. So we have air raid fashion. Women would buy brooches to put on the outside of the clothing that you essentially charge all day in the sun and then at night or when air raids were going on when you dont have lights, and you can have the brooch to see where people are. Same thing goes with glow in the dark buttons. Sometimes they would be sewn , so the pajamas or robes you could see people and where they are without standing out too much. I have not been, but in england, they have a fabulous war museum and they had some great things that becky and i couldnt explain better, so we have one more quick video. [video clip] i am a historian in london. We are in the fashion ration exhibition in an area called functional fashion. In this section we have an example of a gas mask handbag. Stylishsee this is a and attractive solution for the essential wartime piece of equipment that all civilians were issued with, a respirator because of the much feared prospect of chemical warfare. The handbag itself has a compartment at the bottom where the respirator fits. In the top, there was space for ordinary daytoday possessions. These were really stylish, Attractive Solutions of how we carry gas masks. We also see other examples of fashion adapted to wartime dangers. We have an example of an allinone zip up garment which people could jump into to run to the air raid shelter in. We have examples of luminous buttons which you pinned onto clothing so that you could be seen in the blackouts because of a rise in collisions between pedestrians and cars. At work and at home, the war changed how people dressed. People had it to our practical clothes but they still wanted to look stylish. [end clip] Irene Winchester so all of you who feel like you have tons of things in your purse, you probably dont have a gas mask. But what a cool way to show innovation into your everyday kind of items. At this point, i would like to open up to any questions that you might have. [laughter] good morning. I was curious to know which museum in england you could visit on fashion . We didnt go. Which is the museum for the research . Irene winchester it was the International War museum. Imperial war museum, thank you, sorry. [laughter] great presentation. Thank you. I am just thinking in the midwest in the u. S. Especially with grp and the mennonites, where their religious exemptions for clothing . I dont think so. We didnt find anything like that. The exceptions, the mail carriers, the police officers. But we did not find anything on religious exemptions. Remember, in the u. S. , they are not rationed clothing, it is just new clothing cant have those things. Does that make sense . Those kinds of restrictions. [indiscernible] those are dresses or clothing you buy in the store as made, does that make sense . They might not have access to that much fabric, but it is just what you are purchasing. That is why the manufacturers were getting in trouble because they were making the clothing. That is a good question. Following up on her question, just like we saw a resurgence in Victory Gardens and canning, did we see a resurgence in the u. S. Are u. K. Are the traditional womens roles of weaving . I dont even know with the right terminology is. Irene winchester they do a lot of mending. Especiallyally huge, when it came to nylons. That was one of the things they tried to repair as much as you could. I didnt find a whole lot of. Becky morrison they talk about corsets going by the wayside. That is extra fabric, extra points, and without one, i can breathe. That was one of the things that we noticed that fell away were corsets. [laughter] did you look into how much at , if at all, this led to the creation of new materials, stuff like polyesters . Irene winchester the bulk of what they were restricting in the u. S. Was wool. That is why your shoes that had cotton and cork were not rationed. So, we didnt get into too much about new materials. One thing that happened is hemlines never went back down. So if you notice that. Polyester is later . Yeah. Great presentation. Two quick questions. Did the u. S. Ever find another source for silk or no . Irene winchester no. And then the followup about food. Did they just assume that everyone knew how to sew or did you find evidence that womens groups or Community Groups had courses and things to teach women how to repair the ir clothing and such . Becky morrison i didnt find a lot of propaganda to imply this is how you do it. In the u. K. Specifically, the womens group that worked together had a lot of meets where they would help each other. Irene winchester i do know from 96yearoldmong my grandmother in law had a son who was growing at more than three shoes per year rate, and she talked about how they did a lot of swapping with other people at the church who had kids or whatever. They would swap clothing. I know that they said his foot was growing so fast, i needed more than three pairs of shoes a year. I think there was cooperation between Church Groups and neighborhoods. This is a little bit more of a comment, and i had previously known that in the late 1940s, Christian Dior debuted looks with higher hemlines and cinched waists and i had not made the connection between that and wartime rationing. Yeah. I was curious if at this time people maybe would sell clothing they were not using, you know, how we have secondhand stores. Or was that a new type of Business People got into . Irene winchester especially the shoes. Secondhand shoes. There weresecondhand shoes. Whole stores of secondhand shoes. I can imagine that they were probably doing the same thing with closing as well. This whole week we have talked about the theme of everyone doing their part. So even down to fashion and to your clothing, if im not using this and my child has outgrown it, let me give it to someone who can use it. So we do see that. Any exceptions made for people who lived in colder climates for longer periods of time . Irene winchester not that what we have seen, which is, especially the country is so huge. In the u. K. , their only exceptions were occupational based. Becky morrison and the boys , like we said, until you are 13, boys in the u. K. Had to wear shorts. Cold yearround, so sorry kids, wear long socks. I wonder if after the war if women just went out and content their hearts when the rationing was over. Irene winchester in the u. K. , the rationing goes until 1949. Once you get into the 1950s, it does open up quite a bit. Yeah. Thats it . Yeah. All right, lets thank becky and irene. [applause] you are watching American History tv, all weekend, every weekend on cspan3. Like us on facebook at cspan history. Announcer next, Indiana University history professor Michael Mcgerr talked about women and feminism in 19601970s popular music. This class was from his course titled rock, hip hop and revolution popular music in the making of modern america, 1940 to the present. 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