Figure 1.-- The advertisement photo is entitled "Just We" and shows a domestic scene with mother helping her three children, a boy of about 12 and daughters about 8 and 10, getting ready for bed. The picture is rather sentimentally entitled "Just We" and the writing underneath reads: "For just this one hour of evening, Mother gathers her little clan and shuts out the big world from "Just We." The children have taken off their outer garments and have removed their long stockings and hose supporters. They are in their bare feet of course. The next stage will be to remove their waist union suits (long legged and long sleeved for chilly autumn and winter weather) and to change into pajamas. The image of Mother in the background is rather dark and hard to see in the image, but it is there.

Another EZ Waist Union Suit image (Ladies Home Journal, October, 1920, p. 86). Notice that again the publisher has artificially highlighted the reinforcement straps over the shoulders, i.e., the taping that carries the strain of buttoned-on clothing from the shoulders. The under-arm tapes with tape loops for attaching hose supporters are also highlighted. The advertisement photo is entitled "Just We" and shows a domestic scene with mother helping her three children, a boy of about 12 and daughters about 8 and 10, getting ready for bed. The picture is rather sentimentally entitled "Just We" and the writing underneath reads: "For just this one hour of evening, Mother gathers her little clan and shuts out the big world from "Just We." The children have taken off their outer garments and have removed their long stockings and hose supporters. They are in their bare feet of course. The next stage will be to remove their waist union suits (long legged and long sleeved for chilly autumn and winter weather) and to change into pajamas. The image of Mother in the background is rather dark and hard to see in the image, but it is there.

EZ Mills

One source indicates that the company was located in Carterville, Geoggia. This may have been where their mill was located. The company appears to have been incorporated in New York. The product line over time included juvenile anb boys' sportswear, including pullover seweaters and bllouses, T-shirts, briefs, trunks, and outer and under shorts. We are not sure when EZ Mills was founded. It appears to have been an important company during the 1920s and 30s. We note quite a few magazine advertisements. There major competitor seems to have been Nazareth.

Ladies Home Journal

The EZ ad here appeared in The Ladies' Home Journal (October, 1920, p. 86). There was no accompanying text. As the oldest still publishing, most respected women's service magazine in the country, The Ladies' Home Journal has always focused on issues of crucial importance to millions of women. Since its first issue in December 1883. This long history make The Ladies Home Journal and invaluable source of information on American fashion trends. Its covered an incredibly wide range of topics beyond just fashion, from the latest medical research and consumer news to parenting know-how, workplace survival, good skincare, nutrition facts and much, much more. It was The Ladies Home Journal who sucessfully merged the elements and produced the right formula, becoming the top ladies magazine in America. The Ladies' Home Journal both empowered women and applauded their growing power. We also notice patterns offered in the magazine.

Domestic Scene

The advertisement photo is entitled "Just We" and shows a domestic scene with mother helping her three children, a boy of about 12 and daughters about 8 and 10, getting ready for bed. The picture is rather sentimentally entitled "Just We" and the writing underneath reads: "For just this one hour of evening, Mother gathers her little clan and shuts out the big world from "Just We." The children have taken off their outer garments and have removed their long stockings and hose supporters. They are in their bare feet of course. The next stage will be to remove their waist union suits (long legged and long sleeved for chilly autumn and winter weather) and to change into pajamas. The image of Mother in the background is rather dark and hard to see in the image, but it is there.

Construction

Notice that again the publisher has artificially highlighted the reinforcement straps over the shoulders, i.e., the taping that carries the strain of buttoned-on clothing from the shoulders. The under-arm tapes with tape loops for attaching hose supporters are also highlighted.

Seasonality

This ad appeared in November when the weather in many places was getting colder--hence the long legs and long sleeves of these children's waist union suits.

Major Companies

The two main brands of waist union suits advertised in most of the magazines of the period were Nazareth and EZ Mils (seen here). This of course excludes the special brands mass-marketed through the Sears and Wards catalogues. The two brands were very similar in construction and offered both knee-length and ankle-length waist suits with the choice of short sleeves or sleeveless suits for summer and long-sleeved suits for winter. The chief difference was in the garter tabs. Nazareth made the "non-rusting metal pin-tube" a special feature as a way of holding the safety-pin of the hose supporter firmly in place and thus preventing "tearing the fabric" of the underwear. The EZ brand made a point of using only "tape loops" for the garter pins, claiming that their system of attaching the supporters avoided rusting or crushing (flattening) the metal tubes in the wringer of washing machines. The tape loops supposedly also held the garter pins firmly in place and avoided tearing the underwear, and tape loops were harder to pull off than the metal tubes. Metal pin tubes, however, seem to have eventually won out in this contest. Hickory and Nazareth underwaists, for instance, used pin tubes rather than tape loops, and many of the popular garter waists such as Kerns did so also. See, for instance, the Kern's Daisy Garter waist from the Sears 1939 catalogue where the detachable supporters are fastened to pin tubes.

Waist Union Suits

Waist Union Suits became fashionable during the 1910s as a way of combining union suits with underwaists in a single garment and had their heyday during the 1920s and 1930s. The ages were generally from 2 to 13. Waist Union Suits (as this image make clear) were worn by both boys and girls and were not gender-specific. Most children of 14 and older no longer wore button-on clothing and so didn't need reinforcement straps on their underwear. If they continued to wear long stockings at 14 or later (a few boys and many girls did), they used garter waists for the most part rather than waist union suits.

Created: 1:15 AM 4/11/2007
Last updated: 1:15 AM 4/11/2007