Apron; weaver's, blue and white striped cotton ticking. Half apron. Apron has one large pocket, 13.875" (35cm) deep; inside is a 1.25" (3.2cm) wide strip sewn with channels to hold reed hooks. The reverse has two pockets 6" (15cm) deep along the bottom edge of the apron. A strip, 16.75" (45cm) and 19" (48.2cm) is sewn at its center to each top corner of the apron; they appear to have been used to tie on the apron.
Girls built America. Girls’ work gave other women leisure time, they made industries more profitable, their cheap labor sparked a consumer revolution, and their activism reshaped labor laws. Through their labor and activism, they made workplaces safer for everyone.
Not all girls had a childhood because they had to work.
Young girls often worked as spinners or bobbin girls. Spinners ran machines that twisted fiber into yarn. Bobbin girls replaced full bobbins of yarn with empty ones. Often, girls wore aprons such as this one to protect their clothes.
Type of sphagnum surgical dressing used by the American Red Cross during World War I. Dressing consists of sphagnum moss enveloped in absorbant paper, laid on a layer of absorbent cotton linters [short fibers that remain on the cottonseed after ginning], and the whole wrapped in cotton gauze or cheesecloth.
One of a series of specimens showing the use of sphagnum moss for surgical dressings as developed during World War I. This material was contributed to the museum in 1920 by Dr. Arno Viehoever, U.S. Department of Agriculture.
These swimming goggles were worn by American Gertrude Ederle (1905-2003) while making her historic swim across the English Channel in August of 1926. Not only was Ederle the first woman to ever complete the feat, only five men had ever accomplished the swim, and she bested their times by almost two hours.
Called America's Best Girl by President Calvin Coolidge, Ederle returned to fame and a ticker-tape parade in New York City. The former Olympican furthered the acceptance of female athletics, helping make the 1920s America's Golden Age of Sport.
Hugh Owen Thomas (1834-1891) was an English bone setter, as were many of his relatives, and it was he who invented the Thomas Splint. His nephew, Colonel Robert Jones, promoted the use of the Thomas splint for the initial treatment of femoral fractures, thus greatly reducing the mortality related to this problem during World War I.
This Thomas Splint was made by the DePuy Manufacturing Company, a firm established in Warsaw, Ind., in 1895, by Revra DePuy (1860-1921), a chemist and pharmaceutical salesman who promoted fiber splints that could be customized to fit patients.
Marked: (Plate) "Radiola Loud Speaker / Radio Corporation of America / Model UZ-1325". (Markings on fiber cone are partially obliterated.) Fiber flare-type speaker horn of early 1920's, with driver unit affixed to base of horn. Driver is essentially a diaphragm-type head telephone with cord and pin plugs. Finish is rusted and specimen needs restoration work. Reference: Clymer-Greenwood, page 180.
A sample piece of H.R. Mallinson's "Slendora Brocade" in a cross-dyed pinkish-brown and green jacquard-woven snakeskin design.The cross-dyed (a form of resist-dyeing) "Slendora Brocade" was Jacquard woven in rayon for the weft figure; contrasting with the silk ground. There were two dyes are in the same bath, and each fiber resists the dye meant for the other fiber for which it has no chemical affinity, thereby enabling a two color effect in one operation. The selvage inscription on this textile length (Mallinson's Fabrics De Luxe) is the one Mallinson used for its products that were not all-silk after an early 1920s 'truth-in-advertising' furor over silk manufacturers using rayon (then artificial silk) in their products without informing consumers.
