Category: Fashion

Our Sunday Best for Easter

Boomers can attest to the changes that have occurred in all aspects of their lives, and certainly fashion is among them. Mister Boomer, as many of his generation, recalls that certain times of the year — especially holidays — were marked in part by new clothes: Christmas always brought underwear and socks, and sometimes pajamas; August ushered in back-to-school necessities; but it was mainly in spring — particularly Eastertime — that most people got new “dress” clothes. It was only a few decades ago that it was not only expected that one dress in their finest clothes for Easter celebrations, but preferably that those clothes be new.

The practice of donning new clothing as a sign of respect, renewal and cleanliness when engaging in spring religious ceremonies dates back thousands of years. It crossed religions and cultures through the millennia to manifest itself in various forms of official and ritual costuming, as well as acting as an annual reminder for ancient peoples — not known for their closets-full of clothing — that it was time to change things up. Some historians postulate that Emperor Constantine helped the tradition along in the fourth century. The story goes that Easter was the only holiday when he invited his entire staff and court to join in his holiday celebration and dinner. His only request was that they arrive washed and dressed in their finest clothing.

Mister Boomer worked retail in the early 1970s. At that point, the new spring/Easter tradition was still going strong. There wasn’t a man, woman or child who did not get at least one new spring article of clothing. Elaborate hats, of course, were popular with women, along with dresses, shoes and accessories in pastel colors, while coats could get downright brilliant in hue. Children received new shoes, at the very least, but the family could also take the opportunity to replenish dress clothing for growing siblings, handing down gently-used garments to the younger children.

A decade earlier, Mister Boomer’s family always participated in the annual ritual. His mother and sister would get new spring dresses, pocketbooks and shoes, while the males would get new suits and, in the early sixties, hats. Mister B doesn’t have to conjure memories of these outfits since they were documented each year. Before heading to Easter Sunday church services (or after, if they were running late), Mister B’s family would pose in front of their house, a few steps from the front porch, for a portrait with their finery. Mister B’s father was never in the shots since he was behind the lens of the Kodak box camera. The dates for Easter shift from year to year, from early March to late April. In the upper Midwest, that could mean temperatures ranging from the low 30s to the mid-70s. The photos show that sometimes the family was shivering in the cold, and patches of snow remained on the lawn. Other times the sun shone brightly to accentuate those Kodachrome colors. Inevitably, the roll of film had been sitting in the camera since Christmas, so now it could be finished and processed into prints.

These portraits illustrated the history of the dwelling — with landscape changes and front-porch renovations — as well as a growing family in the 1960s suburbs. In one photo in particular, Mister B recalls wearing a new three-piece suit. The coat was blue, in a mid-weight knobby fabric, while the pants were plain, straight-legged, and Navy in color; his vest, however, was patterned in contrast to the pleated pants and textured coat. On top of his head was a Navy blue hat, making the ensemble suitable for a Frank Sinatra album cover.

Mister Boomer’s family was not fashion-forward. They dressed in the popular clothing of the day. That began to change throughout the culture in the mid-60s as individual personalities gained a larger say in dress habits. It was probably 1967 when Mister B’s brother, a high school student at the time, suggested that the males get their Easter suits from a nearby urban source rather than the usual suburban regional chain stores.

Mister B, his father and Brother Boomer drove to the big-city establishment. Immediately on entering the store, it was obvious they weren’t in suburbia any more: BanLon shirts, pencil-thin ties, straight-legged pants and sharkskin suits packed the racks and shelves in a wide array of colors. Sharkskin suits had been around since the 1950s. Composed of two contrasting thread colors woven so as to contrast, the result was a sleek, sharkskin look. Now, with the addition of rayon, silk and acetate fabrics joining the traditional wool, 60s sharkskin often had an iridescent ripple running through the folds of fabric as light passed over it.

Mister B’s father quickly tried on a burgundy sharkskin suit and was gazing at it admiringly in the mirror. Brother B chose a sharkskin suit in dark blue that looked like it had walked straight out of a Beatles photograph. Lapels were as small as they could be, but Brother Boomer’s choice had a velvet strip running across the top of the collar, slightly framing either side of the neck. Mister Boomer was a little hesitant in his search, but did find an olive-green sharkskin suit in his size. It had a golden-colored thread woven into the fabric, so a slight gold metallic sheen gave Mister B an adult, sophisticated sartorial look well beyond his teenage years.

sharkskin

That Easter, the Boomer family males sported white shirts and super-thin ties in solid colors with their stylish suits. A new era was happening, and men no longer wore hats as a required accessory to top an outfit. The Boomer Three looked more like a musical group than family members heading to church, and a few heads did turn, but they didn’t mind. Mister B got another three years’ wear out of the suit before it no longer fit. There are still times Mister B dreams of that sharkskin suit. No article of clothing ever caused the physical attachment of that outfit since.

How about it boomers? Is there a memorable spring outfit in your past?

Female Boomers and Their Hair Apparent

Beauty products, and in particular hair care products for women, started to come into a class all their own in the 1950s. Prior to then, there were some traditional brands that the average woman used that were both domestic and imported, but in the first of the boomer decades, new companies cropped up and aggressive marketing campaigns were initiated to capture the attention of young boomers and their mothers. Most importantly, these products were priced for affordability and were readily available in drug and discount stores.

In Mister Boomer’s experience with these products — through use by his mother, aunts and younger boomer sister — these beauty products fell mainly into two categories: hair products and perfume and cologne (which will be covered in the future).

Hair Care
In Mister Boomer’s household, his mother dictated the shampoo choice in his early years. Like other women of her day, she preferred Breck or Prell shampoo. A bottle of Breck or the glass bottle of Prell, then later the plastic tube when it became available, was ever-present at the edge of the bathroom tub. Mister Boomer recalls the Breck commercial and how it came in three formulas based on normal, dry or oily hair. The ornate Olde English letter “O” on the bottle indicated Mister B’s mom had purchased the oily hair formula.

Breck had actually been one of the early brands that the grandmothers of boomers would recognize. Appearing in 1908, it was one of the first shampoos manufactured in the U.S. Breck Girls ads started appearing around 1936; the artist, Charles Sheldon, preferred to draw “real” women rather than models. In 1957, Robert Williams Williams took over for Mr. Sheldon. It was his pastel drawings that so impressed a young Mister Boomer, a budding young artist himself. He would gaze at the Breck Girls on the backs of the family magazines like Look, Life and Good Housekeeping. Not only were the idealized women beautiful — and with exquisite hair — but the pastel drawings exhibited artistic technique which was something to aspire to. In 1963, the company was sold to American Cyanamid, but the Breck Girls campaign continued until the death of Mr. Williams in 1976. By the mid-60s, Mr. Williams was drawing models rather than “real” women, though he attempted to add a bit of their individual personalities into each drawing as befitted the age.

The family all used one bottle of shampoo until it was gone. Mister B recalls not liking Breck very much at all, so it was a welcome change when Prell appeared. He recalls that it had a funny smell, but could lather like there was no tomorrow. It also left a slightly floral smell in his hair that lingered for a little while; that was not a particularly favorite trait for a product a boy wanted to sport.

The Aberto Culver Company was one of those formed in the first boomer decade. Leonard Lavin borrowed $400,000 to buy a hair conditioning formula invented by a scientist named Alberto, and built his company around his flagship product — Alberto VO5 — in Chicago in 1955. He immediately embarked on an aggressive television campaign, a risky move for many reasons in the early days of TV. The campaign worked, and by 1958, it was the number one product in its niche.

Mister Boomer recalls his mother using the product on occasion, which meant there were some elementary school days when Mister B had VO5 slicking his hair rather than Brylcreem. Mister B doesn’t recall his sister ever using the product, but both his grandmother and aunt always had a tube visible in their bathrooms. Consequently, in his mind, this product was intended more for older women than growing female boomers.

Hair always reflects the styles of the era, and certainly the boomer decades of the 1950s and 60s were no exception. Perhaps no female hair product can better represent the 50s than hair spray. High on the charts of top-selling hair sprays was Aqua Net. A true product of the boomer age, Aqua Net was an American product that was first released in the early 1950s. Right from the start it was an ideal fit to hold the popular bouffant and beehive styles of the day. The women in Mister B’s life used it, especially his mother. But from a young guy’s perspective, it didn’t make any sense to shellac hair to a shell-like consistency. A couple of decades later, Mister B was taught to use the stuff as a spray fixative for charcoal drawings. At less than two dollars a can, it was much cheaper than art fixatives.

Finally, in one of those strange categories of products that men rarely understand, there was Dippity-do. This gooey stuff was sold in a squat, clear jar, presumably so you could see the bubbles inside the gel. For a while, a jar took up residency on top of the toilet tank in the Mister Boomer household. He thinks his mother used it more than his sister, but there it sat. To a young boomer boy it was a mysterious thing that looked more like a science experiment than a hair care product. The TV ads seem to have been constantly playing, and it was evident the company was trying to appeal to a younger audience with their young models and groovy type used for the product packaging.

To a growing boomer boy, female hair products were a strange, off-putting world. Older neighborhood boomer girls would act as babysitters for Mister B and his siblings every now and then, wearing huge curlers and high hair drenched with products. His mother, being from an earlier generation, dabbled in the new products, but when push came to shove, she remained a woman of her own era. Mister B’s sister was a couple of years younger, so by the time she reached her teenage years, softer hair was coming in and there was less reliance on hair products to complete one’s style. She was more the Gee Your Hair Smells Terrific age than the Aqua Net age.

What about your experiences, boomer ladies? What female hair products did you or your siblings use?