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Short Stuff: Flappers · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the Short Stuff. I'm Josh, and
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: there's Chuck, and Jerry's here doing the Charleston on Dave's behalf,
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: and this is Stuff You Should Know Short Stuff. Let's
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: go now. All right.
• 0:16
  Speaker 2: The year is 1915, everybody, and the word flapper is
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: about to be introduced to the world by way of H. L. Minkin,
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: a writer who wrote a, I guess, an essay about
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: called the flapper for the literary magazine, The Smart Set.
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: What a great mag.
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: By the way, we should say that Private Eye is
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: not a rag over in the UK. So sorry, everybody.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: I'm going to go ahead and assume The Smart Set
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: wasn't either. But in this article or essay, Mencken is
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: using a term that's already been established, flapper. It was,
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: I think, British slang for a young girl, right? He's saying, no, no, no.
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: We need to get more specific. There is a young
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: girl that's emerging. They're not here yet, but I can
• 1:03
  Speaker 1: see them coming out of the fabric of culture. And
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: they are not going to follow these standards and traditions
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: and moral codes that are handed down generation after generation.
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: There's this new thing called media that is coming up,
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: and that's what's going to influence them. And they're going
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: to be total trailblazers. And he was right. Yeah.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: So the flapper would come along and kick what was
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: known as the Gibson Girl to the curb. The Gibson
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: Girl during the 1910s was created and popularized from an
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: illustrator named Charles Dana Gibson. And this was like if
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: you think of the Edwardian sort of corset wearing, updo
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: hair wearing, choker, you know, like choker. dress that goes,
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: a skirt that goes all the way to the past
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: the ankle and like a choker up to under the chin.
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: That's the Gibson girl look. And the flapper came along
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: and said, no, no, no, no. We want to have
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: more fun than that.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: They did. And they did. And it took the death
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: of tens of millions of people to get them there.
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: Because World War I and the 1918 flu pandemic were
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: a one-two punch that killed a lot of people around
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: the world. And in doing so, both of those things
• 2:18
  Speaker 1: adjusted gender norms to the extent that all of a sudden,
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: like the world couldn't afford to just keep women off
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: to the side any longer. They were needed more than ever,
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: like in the workforce, they needed to be educated. And
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: so it opened all these opportunities for women to just
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: kind of come out from under the thumb of their
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: fathers and then their husbands. Yeah.
• 2:39
  Speaker 2: And this kind of happened around 1920. When the Roaring
• 2:43
  Speaker 2: Twenties came on the scene, there was a new woman
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: emerging from the cocoon that kind of coincided with like, hey,
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: we'd like to have a right to vote, kind of
• 2:53
  Speaker 2: early feminist causes as well. And both the 18th and
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: 19th Amendments were both pretty crucial to the rise of
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: this new kind of style of woman, which was prohibition,
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: which sent people into underground bars hanging out and then
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: the right to vote. And both of these things were
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: sort of like a rejection of the Victorian code that
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: came before.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, big time. I mean, this wasn't like a transition over,
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: you know, the course of decades that just one piece
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: followed another. This was like a razor blade cutting off
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: the old guard and starting anew. And it was led
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: by this leading edge of young, like early 20s people.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: late teens girls who just completely just changed everything. They
• 3:48
  Speaker 1: went against so many norms. They started smoking. They started drinking.
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: Women did not do those things at that time. They
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: started wearing makeup. Women did not wear makeup unless you
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: were a sex worker or an actress. They just did
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: all this stuff that up to that point was just
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: not done. And they just started doing it all of
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: a sudden. Yeah.
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: Two other big things that kind of spurred this was
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: the rise of the automobile. More and more people had cars.
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: So all of a sudden, not only could young women
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: like drive themselves places and they weren't literally sort of
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: under lock and key of their of their home or
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: their parents homes. But all of a sudden, boys and
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: young men could come along and pick them up and
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: take them out on a date. And, you know, sometimes
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: things would happen in cars and like everything was changing.
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: The other big one was the radio. KDKA in Pittsburgh
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: was the first, I guess, commercial broadcast station. And by 1924,
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: there were more than 600 of those. And all of
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: a sudden there was like music happening and movies happening
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: that featured different styles and young women like, you know,
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: dancing and having fun.
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah. People driving around in convertibles in New York, booming Jay-Z.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: It was amazing.
• 4:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: I thought that was so stupid. No, it was great.
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: Let's take a break and we'll come back. Chuck and
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: I are going to work out whether that was actually
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: stupid or not.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: <HAL> <HAL> <HAL> <HAL> <HAL>.
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: <HAL> <HAL> <HAL> Also, Chuck, before we get started again,
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: I want to shout out Conger for writing this. This
• 5:42
  Speaker 1: is a Conger joint from How Stuff Works, this article was.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: That's right. Go check out Unladylike, the podcast. It's great.
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: And so is Kristen.
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: Exactly. So there was a new woman that emerged from
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: that right to vote. You can kind of say that
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: those two amendments that came out so quickly together, the
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: 18th and 19th, One was for the flappers. That was
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: the prohibition on alcohol because it created speakeasies, like you said.
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: The right to vote, that created this kind of other
• 6:15
  Speaker 1: thread of women called the new woman who were very
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: interested in being active politically and socially. The flappers were like, yeah,
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: you go have fun with that. We're going to go
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: get wasted and hang out in speakeasies in New York
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: and just live our funnest lives. Yeah.
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: Or maybe go see a Clara Bow movie because in 1922,
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: Clara Bow debuted in Beyond the Rainbow and kind of
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: defined the flapper look. She had that hair bobbed. She
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: had a little bit of makeup on. The flapper style
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: was really coming in vogue. In real life, you had
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: none other than Zelda Fitzgerald as a late teen when
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: she was with F. Scott Fitzgerald when he first gained fame.
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: I think I think before she was writing even, uh,
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: and she was sort of one of the first big
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: it girls, uh, and certainly, um, embodied that flapper style.
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Also, I don't want, I don't know who I
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: said was the first it girl, but I was wrong.
• 7:16
  Speaker 1: It was in some other, um, podcast a while back,
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: but I, I, whoever it was, was in like the
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: forties or fifties, but I think Clara Bow is the
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: actual first it girl. Okay. And then I guess Zelda
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: Fitzgerald was the first real life it girl, but, Let's
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: talk about some of those fashions that people like Claire
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Bow and Zelda Fitzgerald rocked. A lot of it was
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: being designed by Coco Chanel.
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: Like the real deal Coco Chanel was designing in Paris
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: during this time. And that whole like Victorian era corset
• 7:49
  Speaker 1: S figure shape was just thrown totally out the window.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: And instead it was boyish bodies with drapey boxy skirts, essentially.
• 8:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that was like that sack dress was like the
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: flapper uniform. The fabric literally was lighter. Conger found this
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: is pretty staggering, but the flapper dress had about seven
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: yards of fabric. A Victorian gown had about 20 yards
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: of fabric. So they literally shed weight in their clothing
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: to just be freer. The flapper dress basically was about
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: mid-calf in length. Um, by the late 1920s, it inched
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: above the knee a little bit. Um, but you know,
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: so they could dance so they could do the Charleston
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: and the, and the Foxtrot. Yeah.
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: Um, they, people think like it immediately went up. That
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: is actually one thing that kind of slowly changed and it,
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: it was just that way for a couple of years. Yeah. Um,
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: one of the other things that is like, like you said,
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: the flapper uniform was the cloche hat. I never knew
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: that's what it was called. Yeah. But it's like a
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: almost brimless hat. It's very close to the head, usually
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: has a big bow. And it would show off their hairdo,
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: which is usually quite short. You mentioned that those Gibson
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: girls had like the big updo or else like long,
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: flowy hair. Another way to rebel against that was to
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: cut your hair very short and often very straight. And
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: sometimes with pomade, that was the flapper girl's haircut. I
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: think it was called the Eaton crop.
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and they might use the pomade to like slick
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: it back like a man might. They would show their–
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: a lot of those flapper dresses had no arms, so
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: they were showing their arms for the first time.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: Scandalous.
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: Very scandalous. A lot of times with a lot of
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: like necklaces and bracelets and things like that. And the wool,
• 9:41
  Speaker 2: those like heavy black wool stockings went out of fashion
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: for a more sheer hosiery. And sometimes– oh, boy. They
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: would roll down that hosiery a little bit to like
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: a makeshift knee high.
• 9:52
  Speaker 1: Not a good look.
• 9:54
  Speaker 2: Oh, I think it is.
• 9:55
  Speaker 1: Do you? You like the roll down knee high look?
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was raised Baptist, all that stuff. is very titillating.
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: I think my problem is I associate that with mama
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: for mama's family.
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that'll do it. Yeah.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: That'll definitely dampen your thoughts. Yes. So all of this
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: flapper party came and went in less than a decade.
• 10:16
  Speaker 1: I mean, Clara Bow hit the scene in 1922, and
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: she was the one in Beyond the Rainbow that really
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: like kind of set the standard. And by 1929, it
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: was all over because the Depression hit and everybody's like,
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: we don't have time for parties anymore. We got bigger
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: fish to fry now. Yeah.
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: And that was kind of it. The stock market crash
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: was like literally the very end. It was October 29th, 1929.
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: And it was just one of those events that kind
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: of kind of signified like the end of an era
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: and definitely the end of the flapper era.
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah. The fun was over. And so was prohibition, too,
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: because America really needed to start drinking again. So there
• 10:55
  Speaker 1: went the speakeasy and all that stuff.
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: And I think that means short stuff's over, too, though, right?
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah. It's not just over, Chuck. It's out.
• 11:07
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• 11:10
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• 11:14
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