WHO WEARS THE PANTS?
Well, we know Ella Shane does. And in 1899, she’s one of the very rare women who’s ever seen in anything but a floor-length skirt away from the beach or bicycle. For the time, that is a Very Big Deal.
There are still plenty of women alive now who can remember when they weren’t allowed to go into spiffy restaurants in a trouser suit. Even I remember someone telling my mother never to dress me in pants again for services at the (admittedly very conservative) church we briefly attended when I was a kid. Let’s just say her response was unholy.
It’s pretty simple: for centuries, pants were what men wore. Of course, there’s a lot of symbolism and cultural weight associated with that, going all the way back to the Bible, where there are verses inveighing against women wearing men’s attire and vice versa. Though, really, in the ancient world, often the only real difference between a man’s garment and a woman’s was color, or possibly length.
And that gets us to the other big issue with pants: practicality. In trousers, men can move and run and do all kinds of things that are much tougher in a skirt. Especially a very long one with layers of petticoats. As long as women have been working, they’ve been working around their clothes, usually tucking the skirts up so they can move easily.
The first time women made a serious effort at wearing pants, in 1851, what quickly became known as the Bloomer Costume was pretty much laughed out of the room, even though the very impressive Elizabeth Cady Stanton was an early adopter. And, honestly, whether by 1850s or 2020s standards, the costume, a long tunic over big puffy pants, does look pretty silly. But it was a try.
What women DID quickly realize was that while they didn’t want to make people giggle while they walked down the street, they sure did enjoy having a little freedom to move. So, by the late 1800s, bloomers and split skirts were a key part of female “sports costumes,” and many women wore them. These were still loose and modest, and often accompanied by thick stockings, even at the beach, so that no one would see too much of one’s “limbs” as seriously Victorian Victorians might say instead of the vulgar “legs.”
Legs, at least the female variety, were not something the Victorians got to see very often. Even ballerinas wore longish tutus, not the little fluffy thigh-length ones we often see now. The only women who showed a lot of leg were chorus girls, and that’s one of the big reasons people made assumptions about them.
So all of that’s in the room when Ella Shane takes the stage in breeches or doublet and (gasp!) hose. She’s not just appropriating the masculine prerogatives of wearing pants, running around and sword fighting; she’s also displaying her very fit body in a way that almost no other respectable woman of the time would be comfortable doing.
Which is why Ella is so aggressively respectable. A few readers have found that odd, wondered why someone as unpretentious and kind as Ella is so very hung up on appropriate behavior. She has to be. Every day of her life is a fight to be seen as a lady and not a chorus girl, simply due to the nature of her work. And all because she wears the pants.
Got an idea for a Throwback Thursday post? Drop it in the comments!
There are still plenty of women alive now who can remember when they weren’t allowed to go into spiffy restaurants in a trouser suit. Even I remember someone telling my mother never to dress me in pants again for services at the (admittedly very conservative) church we briefly attended when I was a kid. Let’s just say her response was unholy.
It’s pretty simple: for centuries, pants were what men wore. Of course, there’s a lot of symbolism and cultural weight associated with that, going all the way back to the Bible, where there are verses inveighing against women wearing men’s attire and vice versa. Though, really, in the ancient world, often the only real difference between a man’s garment and a woman’s was color, or possibly length.
And that gets us to the other big issue with pants: practicality. In trousers, men can move and run and do all kinds of things that are much tougher in a skirt. Especially a very long one with layers of petticoats. As long as women have been working, they’ve been working around their clothes, usually tucking the skirts up so they can move easily.
The first time women made a serious effort at wearing pants, in 1851, what quickly became known as the Bloomer Costume was pretty much laughed out of the room, even though the very impressive Elizabeth Cady Stanton was an early adopter. And, honestly, whether by 1850s or 2020s standards, the costume, a long tunic over big puffy pants, does look pretty silly. But it was a try.
What women DID quickly realize was that while they didn’t want to make people giggle while they walked down the street, they sure did enjoy having a little freedom to move. So, by the late 1800s, bloomers and split skirts were a key part of female “sports costumes,” and many women wore them. These were still loose and modest, and often accompanied by thick stockings, even at the beach, so that no one would see too much of one’s “limbs” as seriously Victorian Victorians might say instead of the vulgar “legs.”
Legs, at least the female variety, were not something the Victorians got to see very often. Even ballerinas wore longish tutus, not the little fluffy thigh-length ones we often see now. The only women who showed a lot of leg were chorus girls, and that’s one of the big reasons people made assumptions about them.
So all of that’s in the room when Ella Shane takes the stage in breeches or doublet and (gasp!) hose. She’s not just appropriating the masculine prerogatives of wearing pants, running around and sword fighting; she’s also displaying her very fit body in a way that almost no other respectable woman of the time would be comfortable doing.
Which is why Ella is so aggressively respectable. A few readers have found that odd, wondered why someone as unpretentious and kind as Ella is so very hung up on appropriate behavior. She has to be. Every day of her life is a fight to be seen as a lady and not a chorus girl, simply due to the nature of her work. And all because she wears the pants.
Got an idea for a Throwback Thursday post? Drop it in the comments!
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