Categories
1900-1949 Women

Spanish Female Beauty, 1924

In Bossypants, Tina Fey, one of the world’s Very Good Things, wrote this about women’s impossible quest to be acceptably attractive.

“Every girl is expected to have caucasian blue eyes, full Spanish lips, a classic button nose, hairless Asian skin with a California tan, a Jamaican dance hall ass, long Swedish legs, small Japanese feet, the abs of a lesbian gym owner, the hips of a nine-year-old boy, the arms of Michelle Obama and doll tits.”

Of course, the standards of beauty change with each generation, just to ensure that women are forever playing a losing game. The porn-inspired standards of hairlessness, for example, and the adventures in eyebrowing which are current beauty tropes, have rather left me behind in a Generation X-rated befuddlement.

In 1924, these were the following rules of Spanish Female Beauty. At least, as according to The Gloucestershire Echo.

Tina Fey’s “full Spanish lips” were, ironically, not to be seen then – lips are dictated to be red, narrow and fine. The extreme hourglass figure is the one to gain approval – wide front, narrow, long waist and large hips.

I can’t imagine anything designated “large” being in the conception of female beauty right now.

The Gloucestershire Echo, 11th January 1924
The Gloucestershire Echo, 11th January 1924

SPANISH FEMALE BEAUTY

There are thirty “ifs” in the Spanish conception of female beauty:-

If Three things are white – Skin, teeth, and hands;

Three things black – Eyes, eyebrows, and eyelashes;

Three things red – Lips, cheeks, and nails;

Three things long – Waist, hair, and hands;

Three things short – Teeth, ears, and feet;

Three things wide – Breast, front, and brow;

Three things narrow – Mouth, waist, and ankle;

Three things large – Arm, hip, and calf;

Three things fine – Lips, hair, and fingers;

Three things small – Nose, head, and bosom.

 

Categories
1900-1949

Every-day Rules, 1924

Some “Every-day Rules” from a Dr West in the Gloucestershire Echo from 1924.

Dr West is in favour of calmness and consideration, kindness and fairness. I can’t argue with him really. His “Never dispute with a man who is more then seventy years of age, nor with an enthusiast,” is invaluable.

And, it’s funny, but “Do not jest so as to wound the feelings of another,” would be described as “Political correctness gone mad” these days, by certain types with less consideration for others.

The Gloucestershire Echo, 11th January 1924
The Gloucestershire Echo, 11th January 1924

Every-day Rules

Never ridicule sacred things, or what others may esteem as such, however absurd they may appear to you.

Never resent a supposed injury till you know the views and motives of the author of it. On no occasion relate it.

Always take the part of an absent person who is censured in company, so far as truth and propriety will allow.

Never think worse of another on account of his differing in political and religious subjects.

Never dispute with a man who is more than seventy years of age, nor with an enthusiast.

Do not jest so as to wound the feelings of another.

Say as little as possible of yourself and of those who are near to you.

Never court the favour of the rich by flattering either their vanities or their vices.

Speak with calmness and deliberation, especially in circumstances which tend to irritate. – Dr West.

Categories
1900-1949 Adverts Food & Drink

Kops Bairn’s Wine, 1924

You can’t give a baby booze, to quote Vic and Bob.

Oh, you can with this one, it’s “temperance”, non-alcoholic “Kops Wine”. Kids wine.

Edinburgh Evening News, 13th November 1924
Edinburgh Evening News, 13th November 1924

Plus, a slagging off in 1891 for temperance “Kops Ale”, below. They are making a joke on the old phrase “a good wine needs no bush” which means, I think, that a good product doesn’t need to be advertised or promoted. “Kops” was so rubbish it didn’t only need a bush, it needed a whole copse (do you see what they did there?)

It doesn’t sound like it was much “kop”! Haha! Well, that’s a better joke than the one below anyway.

Lichfield Mercury, 10th July, 1891
Lichfield Mercury, 10th July, 1891

Categories
1900-1949

Infectious Patients Update, 1935

Most of my assumptions about what visiting time at hospitals used to be like I’ve gleaned from the Carry On films. That, and the 1959 episode of Hancock’s Half Hour I was listening to on the bus earlier, “Hancock in Hospital”, where the lad is kept in for weeks with a broken leg and visiting time lasted for a mere two hours, once a week.

The most I’ve been in hospital was for 3 nights after a cesarean section and that felt like plenty long enough, quite apart from the insane situation of having major surgery, which you recover from by immediately having to look after and feed a newborn all through the night. And in fact I first listened to that Hancock episode while I was in hospital for another operation three years ago, but it turns out morphine injections rather hamper your concentration and I couldn’t remember any of it, so it was nice to listen to it again while I was in sound mind.

Anyway, in short, I don’t really know how visiting time worked for sure. But I have become fascinated by the infectious patient reports in old newspapers. Local newspapers used to print information about such patients, who presumably weren’t allowed visitors at all as a general rule – each patient had a number and their friends and family could consult the paper to check their progress.

Portsmouth Evening News, 25th February, 1935
Portsmouth Evening News, 25th February, 1935
Edinburgh Evening News, 13th November 1924
Edinburgh Evening News, 13th November 1924

So many stories there, reduced to the bare bones of information. I find myself worrying about the dangerously ill patients. Considering the information needed to be with the paper to be printed the day before, did the friends and family find out and get to the hospital in time?

Categories
1900-1949 Women

Advice for Husbands and Wives, 1924

Marital advice used to be a much more common subject for newspaper articles and books. I suppose in days gone by more people were married at a much younger age, when you might have hardly any clue about the opposite sex. I’ve got a few interesting snippets of this sort of thing that I’ll be making a bit of a regular feature of for a while. Some odd, some funny, some infuriating, but a lot of it still useful, by and large.

First up, here’s some advice for husbands and wives from the Gloucester Echo in 1924. Under the humorous tone there’s a few useful pieces of advice. Although, the last line of the Advice to Wives is a bit dark – not only that, it is pretty much exactly the same as the most recent marital advice I have heard, that of Davina McCall just a couple of weeks ago – here, which caused quite some controversy.

ADVICE TO HUSBANDS

Kiss your wife occasionally. Even if you married for money it’s as well to conceal the fact as long as you decently can.

Don’t have a fit of apoplexy if she exceeds her dress allowance. Every article in her wardrobe costs three times as much as yours and lasts one quarter as long.

You ought to feel flattered if another man shows appreciation of your wife’s charms. It reflects credit on your judgement. Besides, women thrive on admiration.

If the reason why you were late was that you were having a rubber at the club, don’t make a mystery of it. If the club had nothing to do with it, the less said the better.

In the domestic Cabinet your wife is Home Secretary. As Chancellor of the Exchequer, and in charge of foreign affairs, you have quite enough to do without interfering in her department.

A woman who criticizes your wife to you is a cat. Cut her.

Don’t grumble if you have to take a grandmother in to dinner. With any luck, you will be a grandfather yourself one day.

ADVICE TO WIVES

Don’t put your husband on a pedestal. It’s an uncomfortable resting-place.  Moreover, the creature has no sense of balance, and is sure to fall off.

The world is full of men who want something for nothing. Steer clear of them.

You have promised to “love, honour and obey”. Obedience is out of date. Honour too much suggests inequality – the relationship of subject and monarch. Love is the only thing that matters.

Be tolerant: it is a virtue that never fails.

In a contest of physical strength, the man is bound to come off victor. “Conquer by yielding” said the old Romans. They knew a thing or two.

Be as charming as you can to his men friends. It is better to have them as allies than as enemies.

If your husband has tea with a woman he knew long before he met you tell him you hope she’ll call on you. She won’t, but he’ll think how wonderful you are.

Don’t imagine that because you’re married it doesn’t matter how you dress. Men have a weakness for pretty things, and a horrid habit, if they can’t get them at home, of going in search of them, and what’s more, finding them.

 

 

 

 

Categories
1900-1949 Adverts Victorian War

Rude Archives

Firstly, sorry for this post.

Actually, this is the kind of thing that annoying hashtag #sorrynotsorry is for, I suppose. But sorry to those on my mailing list who may be looking at this at work, and also for those not keen on swearing. For you, I will leave a decency gap, and a little extract from Blackadder III’s “Ink and Incapability” that pretty much sums up my investigations for today. But it’s my birthday today so indulge me.

Samuel Johnson has just written his Dictionary and the Prince Regent has been looking up some words in it….

 

Samuel Johnson: So, ahem, tell me, sir, what words particularly interested you?

Prince Regent: Oh, er, nothing… Anything, really, you know…

Samuel Johnson: Ah, I see you’ve udnerlined a few (takes dictionary, reads): `bloomers’; `bottom’; `burp’; (turns a page) `fart’; `fiddle’; `fornicate’?

Prince Regent: Well…

Samuel Johnson: Sir! I hope you’re not using the first English dictionary to look up rude words!

Blackadder: I wouldn’t be too hopeful; that’s what all the other ones will be used for.

 

Yes, I’ve been looking up rude words in the British Newspaper Archive. Obviously, being newspapers, they aren’t chock-a-block with intentional swears. But there’s a few anachronistic words that appear in a non-sweary way, at the time. “Wanker” being one. Here’s a few clippings that made me giggle quite a lot.

Well, this is sad – an article about casualties from the First World War. But it’s livened up a bit by the fact that one of the casualties is called General Wanker von Dankenechweil.

Evening Despatch, 30th November 1914
Evening Despatch, 30th November 1914

Then there’s this proprietor of glasses in 1863 – “Wankers”. They are keen to help innkeepers provide the correct measures and avoid prosecution.

Wrexham Advertiser, 31st October 1863
Wrexham Advertiser, 31st October 1863

But, my favourite – this 1924 account of the trial of a Frenchman called Vaquier. He was accused of murdering a pub landlord by poison. Hopefully not because of his short measures.

Yorkshire Evening Post, 24th July 1924
Yorkshire Evening Post, 24th July 1924

He was unsuccessfully appealing his death sentence. His response – “I protest because I am French”.

Yorkshire Evening Post, 24th July 1924
Yorkshire Evening Post, 24th July 1924

It was revealed that the alias he used while buying the poison was “Wanker”. Whether this was because “Vaquier” isn’t a million miles away, or the fact that the landlord’s pub was called “The Blue Anchor”, or that he really just was openly proud to be a wanker, we’ll never know.

Yorkshire Evening Post, 24th July 1924
Yorkshire Evening Post, 24th July 1924

Best sub-header ever.