When the girls came out to play : the birth of American sportswear / Patricia Campbell Warner.
Record details
- ISBN: 1558495495 (pbk. : alk. paper)
- ISBN: 9781558495494 (pbk. : alk. paper)
- ISBN: 1558495487 (library cloth : alk. paper)
- ISBN: 9781558495487 (library cloth : alk. paper)
- Physical Description: xxii, 292 p. : ill. ; 24 cm.
- Publisher: Amherst : University of Massachusetts Press, c2006.
Content descriptions
Bibliography, etc. Note: | Includes bibliographical references (p. 249-278) and index. |
Formatted Contents Note: | Factors of change -- Women move out-of-doors : croquet and skating -- Taking up tennis -- Bathing and swimming : seeking a "sensible costume" -- Women enter the Olympics : a sleeker swimsuit -- Bicycling and the bloomer -- Trouser wearing : early influences -- The rise of interest in exercise for women -- Innovation at Wellesley : a uniform for crew -- The debut of the gym suit -- Taking exercise clothes to new places : women biologists at Woods Hole -- The merging of public and private : sportswear and the American style. |
Search for related items by subject
Subject: | Sport clothes for women > United States > History > 20th century. Sports for women > United States > History > 20th century. |
Available copies
- 1 of 1 copy available at Kirtland Community College.
Holds
- 0 current holds with 1 total copy.
Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Status | Due Date |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Kirtland Community College Library | GT 1855 .W37 2006 | 30534839 | General Collection | Available | - |
Electronic resources
CHOICE_Magazine Review
When the Girls Came Out to Play : The Birth of American Sportswear
CHOICE
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Warner (theater, Univ. of Massachusetts) examines a heretofore untapped area of US social history: how informal clothing developed in the 1800s in response to middle-class leisure activities, competitive sports, and attitudes related to health. With wit and personal anecdotes, she reveals the rationale for the evolution in fashions from body-restricting women's Victorian styles to loose, comfortable, informal modern wear. Warner separates public outdoor sports, where women usually wore fashionable styles and participated with men, from private indoor exercises involving only women, where experiments in clothing emerged. In the 1850s, women wearing conservative but slightly adjusted wide skirts with crinolines first engaged in lawn croquet and ice skating, later tennis. Bathing and swimming presented the biggest challenges for dressmakers because clinging fabrics reveal body shapes and modesty surpassed efficiency in 19th-century design criteria. Big changes came around 1900 with women's involvement in the Olympics--first in tennis, golf, archery; later, figure skating, swimming, and gymnastics. Noteworthy is Warner's extensive documentation of early exercise clothing worn in private women's colleges during the late 19th century, for calisthenics and basketball (gym suits) and the many varieties of crew outfits worn at Wellesley. This pioneering work should spawn further women's history studies. Contains 79 "charming" illustrations. Summing Up: Highly recommended. All levels/libraries. B. B. Chico Regis University