Figure 1.--Daguerreotypes are typiclly undated. This wonderful tinted dag was probably taken about 1850. Both boys and girls wore ringlet curls, but at the time they were more common for girls. |
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HBC has some information about girl's hair styling. HBC has collected this information in an effort to help identify who is who in old photographs, but readers specifically interested in girls' hair styles may find it useful. Interestingly boys and girls over time have had some of the same syles, but often not at the same time. One particularly importnt element is the part. Boys have had long hair, even ringlet curls. Girls have had short hair, but not the cropped hair styles worn by European boys in the early 20th century. We have collected information on both hair stules and hair bows.
HBC does not plan on going into great detail on girls' hair cuts. Er have always been hopefull that some one would lauch a sister site on girls historical clothing and styles. Assessing gender in old photographs, however, is such a difficult problem that we have concluded that some basic information about girls' hair styles, especially 19th century girls' styles would be useful. Just as you can not assume that children with long hair are girls, it is also true that you can not assume that children with short hair are girls. What we want to do here is to assess stylistic and chronolgical trends associated with girls' hair styles. We want to assess styles like bangs, curls, parts, and other hair styles.
It was for girls that it was most important to keep up with the latest style for hair bows. The memoirs of many well known women touch upon the hair bows they wore as children. The famous 1920s film star Gloria Swanson, for example, commented on the hair bows she wore. Her mother and grand mother appear to have believed that young Gloria had large ears. Althogh noted at birth, the impact of her large ears was not felt until she was old enough to have her hair styled. Swanson wrote, "While all the other girls my age were wearing teeny tiny hair ribbons, my mother made giant silk bows and poufs for me to hide my ears." It appears to have been less important to follow the latest styles of hair bows when doing a boy's hair. Even so, hairbows for boys have varied in size, color, knot, and position. Some of these changes have varied over time. Others have shown no clear time line change. Following these trends is complicated as they varied sometimes significantly in different countries. The custom of tieing bows in boys' hair, for example, seems to have been most common in France.
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