Seven years before Emily Davison stepped out in front of the King's horse at Epsom for the cause of women's suffrage, this photograph of a group of Maori dress reformers was taken in in Waipawa, New Zealand. By 1906 women in New Zealand - and that meant Maori women too - had already had the vote for thirteen years. How confidently these six young women stand and sit or lean, with legs astride or casually crossed. How unabashed they are about meeting the camera's gaze. At first glance, I thought they might be about to mount horses and go off riding, and I took the sheepskin for a straw bale. But their shoes don't look quite sturdy enough for stirrups. If that is a stable, it looks empty. These women are clearly wearing these splendid knickerbockers simply because the garments are comfortable and practical and rational. What should we think about their bold, striped ties? The watch chains? Their long, loose hair? Those clasped hands? I came across the picture while trying to find out about clothing in the nineteenth-century Pacific, and was immediately intrigued. All I can tell you is that it was first published in the Weekly Press, a weekly edition of a Christchurch newspaper called The Press which had pages of photographs from around New Zealand and also overseas. It's simply titled (by the library, I believe) 'A group of Maori women dress reformers', and was taken by a man called William Golder in Waipawa. My immediate instinct was to follow that lead, and I quickly enough identified him as a Scottish settler-poet with an interest in photography. A tempting lead, given my own interest in nineteenth-century photography, generated by working on the Paris Commune. And then I stopped myself. What was I doing - pursuing the man who had taken this picture - when my focus (and yours) should be on its anonymous, independent subjects? Many thanks to Christchurch City Libraries - Ngā Kete Wānanga-o-Ōtautahi - for permission to use this photograph. You can find out more about New Zealand's dress reform movement and see a picture of the famous 'knickerbocker wedding' here. www.lydiasyson.com
Living in southeastern Ontario, I count on
having white Christmases. To everyone’s surprise and disappointment, this
year’s was warm and browny-green, so my family and I made the best of it by
riding our bikes often along a waterfront path that follows the curve of Lake
Ontario. I seldom spare much thought for my riding gear (apart from wearing a
helmet) but in the past week, I’ve been consumed with appreciation for the
women of the Rational Dress Society.
In her Bicycle Book, Bella Bathurst quotes early
American feminist Susan B. Anthony as saying, in 1896, “Let me tell you what I
think of bicycling. I think it has done more for the emancipation of women than
anything else in the world”. As Bathurst notes, “It was a surprising claim.”
The earliest bicycles were called
velocipedes. They were mass-produced from 1857, but it took a hardy and
determined cyclist to appreciate the ride they offered: velocipedes were built of
wood, with the later addition of metal tires. When pedalled over patchily paved
roads, it’s no wonder they became known as “boneshakers”. The velocipede
evolved into the penny-farthing bicycle of the 1870s, with its enormous front
wheel. Gears had yet to be invented, so the big wheel enabled the cyclist to
ride quickly while pedalling at a reasonable rate. It also improved the ride
quality.
Two men on pennyfarthings, California, 1866. Image via wikipedia
However, women of the 1870s were still
trapped in highly structured skirts with bustles – possibly an improvement over the huge
crinoline of the 1860s, but still terribly cumbersome and constricting.
Detail from "Too Early", by Tissot. Image via wikipedia.
It’s impossible to think
of athletic activity in such clothing, or even what we now consider a normal
range of motion. Contrast the lines of Tissot's gowns (above) with this recent instructional video, which shows
how tricky it is to mount and dismount a pennyfarthing.
Some women of means briefly considered the
tricycle. According to Bathurst, “While out in her carriage one day at Osborne,
Queen Victoria spotted a lady on a trike at a distance. Intrigued, she ordered
her driver to speed up. The trike rider looked round, realised who her pursuer
was, panicked and took off. Sadly, the Queen did not succumb to the temptation
to give chase. Instead, she asked to meet the trike’s inventor, James Starley…
[and] was pleased enough with the trike to order two. Even so, trike fever
never really caught on. Not because there was anything inherently wrong with
them, but because the bicycle was better.” It was only with the invention of
the safety bicycle in the late 1880s that women began to embrace the machine.
With the safety bicycle came an immediate
and predictable public uproar at the spectre of ladies sitting astride a bike,
revealing the existence of legs and possibly damaging the “feminine organs of
matrimonial necessity” (quoted in Bathurst)! And there was the very real problem of riding whilst
wearing a corset and some 20 pounds’ worth of clothing. It was at this moment
that cyclists and clothing reformers found common cause.
"Ladies safety bicycle" from 1889. Image via wikipedia.
Bloomers had been worn – and ridiculed –
since their invention in 1851, by the American activist Elizabeth Smith Miller.
It required huge confidence to wear bloomers in public: even Amelia Bloomer,
who lent her name to the garments, had given up on bloomers by 1859 in favour
of undergarment reform. Despite the founding of the Rational Dress Society in
1881, the wearing of bloomers or rational dress (ample trousers overlaid with a
shorter skirt) was still considered eccentric and even morally suspect.
For example, dress reformer and bicycle
enthusiast Lady Harberton was refused service in the ladies’ lounge of the
Hautboy Hotel in Surrey on the grounds that she was wearing bloomers. She was
directed to the bar, where the only other women were prostitutes. When Lady
Harberton sued the hotel, the jury found in favour of the landlady.
Despite such setbacks, the bicycle offered just
the necessary incentive for the rational dress movement to stick. Bathurst quotes Rose Macaulay's description of the sensation of bicycling as “glorious; the nearest approach to
wings permitted to man and woman here below”. Speed, independence, and the
sensation of flying? In the long run, the bustle didn’t stand a chance.
