This spring I was a widowed garment worker (they made overalls) ca. 1916 for our Spirits of Oakwood Cemetery tour this spring. According to the newspaper, all of her pallbearers were female wearing white shirtwaists and black skirts. I made the Elsie WWI era blouse out of white dimity (Wearing History), the Evelyn ca. 1917 skirt with pockets out of black linen (Wearing History), and the 1915 simple new hat from a nice black polyester with a subtle sheen, with simple small black ostrich feather, and a small black sequined ornament (Ageless Patterns). I'll be using this outfit again for a local historical society presentation so it's still out.
BTW, a year after Ollie Ceawright died the factory got a military uniform contract for WWI, the women wanted to unionize, the owner laughed, they went out on strike and they got their union. As far as I know it was the first union with women in our town. Vicki Betts Tyler, Texas _______________________________________________ h-costume mailing list [email protected] https://indra.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/h-costume
