History Warp (9/03-09): Fashion of Different Eras

Posted: September 3rd, 2012 | Filed under: History Warp | No Comments »

Let’s just say Peter the Great came by his idiosyncrasies honestly. Sophia Romanov tried to have him and her other brother, Ivan, killed on more than one occasion. Fortunately for the boys, the palace guards charged with the deed balked. So, saved of his breath, Peter married, jetsetted to Europe where he learned about the good life.

Then he returned to Russia and crushed a revolt, with extreme prejudice. After attaining the throne, he sent that sister off to a nunnery in Novodevichy.

And, admiring the style of the Euro party class, on September 5, 1698, he ordered that all men in the land cut their beards to a fashionable length, like those favored in Amsterdam’s discos.

Those failing to be shorn were taxed for their rebelliousness.

* * * * *

Time has fogged up my memory more than a little bit, but . . . didn’t it used to be on Labor Day Weekend that tuning in to the Miss American Pageant from Atlantic City was mandatory? Bert Parks fawning over the contestants, then sealing the deal with his slightly off key version of “There she is, Miss America/ etc etc.”

I believe it was. Now the pageant is but an afterthought. I’m frankly not sure where it is contested these days or when?

I can advise that it was September 7, 1921 that one Margaret Gorman, all sixteen years of her, was tabbed as the first Miss America. In Atlantic City, of course. Without Bert Parks, who didn’t become a fixture on that scene until 1955 (September 10, to be exact.)

For the statisticians in the crowd, I can advise Miss Gorman America’s measurements were 30-25-32.



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