What Were Flappers Like in the Roaring Twenties

In the 1920s, flappers—young women with new ideas about how to live—broke away from the Victorian image of womanhood. They dropped the corset, chopped their hair, dropped layers of clothing to increase ease of movement, wore make-up, created the concept of dating, and became a sexual person. In breaking away from conservative Victorian values, flappers created what many considered the new or modern woman. The Younger Generation Before the start of World War I, the Gibson Girl was the rage. Inspired by Charles Dana Gibsons drawings, the Gibson Girl arranged her long hair loosely on top of her head and wore a long straight skirt and a shirt with a high collar. In this image, she both retained femininity and broke through several gender barriers, for her attire allowed her to participate in sports, including golf, roller skating, and bicycling. Then World War I started. The young men of the world were being used as cannon fodder for an older generations ideals and mistakes. The attrition rate in the trenches left few with the hope that they would survive long enough to return home. The young soldiers found themselves inflicted with an eat-drink-and-be-merry-for-tomorrow-we-die spirit. Far away from the society that raised them and faced with the reality of death, many searched (and found) extreme life experiences before they entered the battlefield. When the war was over, the survivors went home and the world tried to return to normalcy. Unfortunately, settling down in peacetime proved more difficult than expected. Post-World War I Changes During the war, the young men had fought against both the enemy and death in faraway lands, while the young women had bought into the patriotic fervor and aggressively entered the workforce. During the war, both the young men and women of this generation had broken out of societys structure. They found it very difficult to return. As Frederick Lewis Allen reported in his 1931 book Only Yesterday, They found themselves expected to settle down into the humdrum routine of American life as if nothing had happened, to accept the moral dicta of elders who seemed to them still to be living in a Pollyanna land of rosy ideals which the war had killed for them. They couldnt do it, and they very disrespectfully said so. Women were just as anxious as the men to avoid returning to societys rules and roles after the war. In the age of the Gibson Girl, young women did not date;  they waited until a proper young man formally paid her interest with suitable intentions (i.e. marriage). However, nearly a whole generation of young men had died in the war, leaving nearly a whole generation of young women without possible suitors. Young women decided that they were not willing to waste away their young lives waiting idly for spinsterhood; they were going to enjoy life. The Younger Generation was breaking away from the old set of values. The Flapper The term flapper first appeared in Great Britain after World War I, as a term which meant a young girl, still somewhat awkward in movement and who had not yet entered womanhood. In the June 1922 edition of the Atlantic Monthly, G. Stanley Hall described looking in a dictionary to discover what the evasive term flapper meant: [T]he dictionary set me right by defining the word as a fledgling, yet in the nest, and vainly attempting to fly while its wings have only pinfeathers; and I recognized that the genius of slanguage had made the squab the symbol of budding girlhood. Authors such F. Scott Fitzgerald and artists such as John Held Jr. first brought the term to the U.S. reading public, half reflecting and half creating the image and style of the flapper. Fitzgerald described the ideal flapper as lovely, expensive, and about nineteen. Held accentuated the flapper image by drawing young girls wearing unbuckled galoshes that would make a flapping noise when walking. Many have tried to define flappers. In William and Mary Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins, they state, In America, a flapper has always been a giddy, attractive, and slightly unconventional young thing who, in [H. L.] Menckens words, was a somewhat foolish girl, full of wild surmises and inclined to revolt against the precepts and admonitions of her elders. Flappers had both an image and an attitude. Catalin Grigoriu / Getty Images Flapper Clothing The Flappers image consisted of drastic—to some, shocking—changes in womens clothing and hair. Nearly every article of clothing was trimmed down and lightened in order to make movement easier. It is said that girls parked their corsets when they were to go dancing. The new, energetic dances of the Jazz Age, required women to be able to move freely, something the ironsides of whalebone didnt allow. Replacing the pantaloons and corsets were underwear called step-ins. The outer clothing of flappers is even still extremely identifiable. This look, called garconne (little boy), was popularized by Coco Chanel. To look more like a boy, women tightly wound their chest with strips of cloth in order to flatten it. The waists of flapper clothes were dropped to the hipline. She wore stockings—made of rayon (artificial silk) starting in 1923—which the flapper often wore rolled over a garter belt.10 The hem of the skirts also started to rise in the 1920s. At first, the hem only rose a few inches, but between 1925 and1927 a flappers skirt fell just below the knee, as described by Bruce Bliven in his 1925 article Flapper Jane in The New Republic: The skirt comes just an inch below her knees, overlapping by a faint fraction her rolled and twisted stockings. The idea is that when she walks in a bit of a breeze, you shall now and then observe the knee (which is     The Goddess Rain Flapper Hair and Make-Up The Gibson Girl, who prided herself on her long, beautiful, lush hair, was shocked when the flapper cut hers off. The short haircut was called the bob which was later replaced by an even shorter haircut, the shingle or Eton cut. The shingle cut was slicked down and had a curl on each side of the face that covered the womans ears. Flappers often finished the ensemble with a felt, bell-shaped hat called a cloche. Flappers also started wearing make-up, something that had previously been only worn by loose women. Rouge, powder, eye-liner, and lipstick became extremely popular. Sneered a shocked Bliven, Beauty is the fashion in 1925. She is frankly, heavily made up, not to imitate nature, but for an altogether artificial effect—pallor mortis, poisonously scarlet lips, richly ringed eyes—the latter looking not so much debauched (which is the intention) as diabetic. Smoking The flapper attitude  was characterized by stark truthfulness, fast living, and sexual behavior. Flappers seemed to cling to youth as if it were to leave them at any moment. They took risks and were reckless. They wanted to be different, to announce their departure from the Gibson Girls morals. So they smoked. Something only men had done previously. Their parents were shocked: W. O. Saunders described his reaction in Me and My Flapper Daughters in 1927. I was sure my girls had never experimented with a hip-pocket flask, flirted with other womens husbands, or smoked cigarettes. My wife entertained the same smug delusion, and was saying something like that out loud at the dinner table one day. And then she began to talk about other girls. They tell me that that Purvis girl has cigarette parties at her home, remarked my wife. She was saying it for the benefit of Elizabeth, who runs somewhat with the Purvis girl. Elizabeth was regarding her mother with curious eyes. She made no reply to her mother, but turning to me, right there at the table, she said: Dad, lets see your cigarettes. Without the slightest suspicion of what was forthcoming, I threw Elizabeth my cigarettes. She withdrew a fag from the package, tapped it on the back of her left hand, inserted it between her lips, reached over and took my lighted cigarette from my mouth, lit her own cigarette and blew airy rings toward the ceiling. My wife nearly fell out of her chair, and I might have fallen out of mine if I hadnt been momentarily stunned. Alcohol Smoking wasnt the most outrageous of the flappers rebellious actions. Flappers drank alcohol. At a time when the United States had outlawed alcohol (Prohibition), young women were starting the habit early. Some even carried hip-flasks full so as to have it on hand. More than a few adults didnt like to see tipsy young women. Flappers had a scandalous image, defined in Jackie Hattons Flapper entry in the 2000 St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture as the giddy flapper, rouged and clipped, careening in a drunken stupor to the lewd strains of a jazz quartet. Dancing The 1920s was the Jazz Age and one of the most popular past-times for flappers was dancing. Dances such as the  Charleston,  Black Bottom, and the  Shimmy  were considered wild by older generations. As described in the May 1920 edition of the  Atlantic Monthly, flappers trot like foxes, limp like lame ducks, one-step like cripples, and all to the barbaric yawp of strange instruments which transform the whole scene into a moving-picture of a fancy ball in bedlam. For the Younger Generation, the dances fit their fast-paced lifestyle. Driving and Petting For the first time since the train and the bicycle, a new form of faster transportation was becoming popular.  Henry Fords  innovations were making the automobile an accessible commodity to the people. Cars were fast and risky—perfect for the flapper attitude. Flappers not only insisted on riding in them; they drove them. Unfortunately for their parents, flappers didnt just use cars to ride in. The back seat became a popular location for the new popular sexual activity, petting. Others hosted petting parties. Though their attire was modeled after little boys outfits, flappers flaunted their sexuality. It was a radical change from their parents and grandparents generations. The End of Flapperhood While many were shocked by the flappers skimpy attire and licentious behavior, a less extreme version of the flapper became respectable among the old and the young. Some women cut off their hair and stopped wearing their corsets, but didnt go to the extreme of flapperhood. In  A Flappers Appeal to Parents,  Ellen Welles Page said: I wear bobbed hair, the badge of flapperhood. (And, oh, what a comfort it is!) I powder my nose. I wear fringed skirts and bright-colored sweaters, and scarfs, and waists with Peter Pan collars, and low-heeled finale hopper shoes. I  At the end of the 1920s, the  stock market crashed  and the world was plunged into the  Great Depression. Frivolity and recklessness were forced to come to an end. However, much of the flappers changes remained. Sources Allen, Frederick Lewis.  Only Yesterday: An Informal History of the Nineteen-Twenties. New York: Harper Brothers Publishers, 1931.Andrist, Ralph K., ed.  The American Heritage: History of the . New York: American Heritage Publishing Co., Inc., 1970.30s20s Baughman, Judith S., ed.  American Decades: 1920-1929. New York: Manly, Inc., 1996.Bliven, Bruce. Flapper Jane.  The New Republic  44 (Sept. 9, 1925): 65-67.Douglas, George H.  Women of the 20s. Saybrook Publishers, 1986.Fass, Paula S.  The Damned and the Beautiful: American Youth in the . New York: Oxford University Press, 1977.1920sHall, G. Stanley. Flapper Americana Novissima.  Atlantic Monthly  129 (June 1922): 771-780.Hatton, Jackie. Flappers.  St. James Encyclopedia of Popular Culture. 2000.Page, Ellen Welles. A Flappers Appeal to Parents.  Outlook  132 (Dec. 6, 1922): 607.Saunders, W. O. Me and My Flapper Daughters.  The American Magazine  104 (Aug. 1927): 27, 121.