Saturday, October 31, 2009

A Screen Test for Bobbed Hair

I do a lot of research - usually of the reading through old newspapers on microfilm variety. And I come across - often by chance - a lot of interesting material unrelated to Louise Brooks. Sometimes I will make a copy of what I find for my files, or to share.

Here is something nifty I recently found. "A Screen Test for Bobbed Hair" ran in a local newspaper in November, 1925.


Just below this contest application was an anonymous article of interest, "Bobbed Hair Brides Are the Fashion Now." Both pieces certainly reflect their times.

3 comments:

  1. hmmm,maybe that's my problem! i haven't found a woman "up to date" enough yet!

    ReplyDelete
  2. The "Brides" story is a reminder that the bob achieved popularity on the street before Louise Brooks did so on the screen. ... Grant Munson was issuing marriage licenses in 1906, when -- after the quake -- he was quoted as saying applications had TRIPLED.

    How edifying it would be, to study portraits of the winners and their differing bobs!

    In 1940, "a small-town barber in Ohio" ran an advertisement ("Look Ladies: The Season's Smartest Styles from Hollywood") that listed twenty (20) classes of bob -- but of the ones above, only the boyish bob made the cut.

    The first photograph of Brooks to appear in a Rochester newspaper ran on the same page (3) as a bob story; December, 1925.

    ReplyDelete

Relevant and respectful comments are welcome. Off-topic comments and spam will be removed, and you will be disliked henceforth.