Figure 1.-- Here we see an unidentified school portrait probably taken about 1930. Notice almost all the girls wear long stockings. This was at a time in which many boys had begun wearing knee socks and even ankle socks as the 1930s progressed. This looks to be a rural school, or at least a small town school in a rural area, because so many boys are wering overalls. We are not sure about the hosiery worn with overalls.

Boys and girls in the 19th century with some differences basically wore the same type of hosiery with very minor differences. Here it is difficult to assess color because of the black and white photography. But from what we can tell, boys and girls wore the same hosiey throughout the 19th century. We do not see white stocking to any extent after the 1860s and this became a major difference between boys and girls in the 20th century. We see many girls wearing white stockings when dressing up or going to school. This was not common for boys, except for younger pre-school boys. We begin to see more pronounced dufferences by the 1930s. Girls tended to commonly wear long stockings in the 1930s, but we see far fewer boys wearing long stockings. Here age was a factor. Only younger boys continued to wear long stockings while even teenage girls might wear them. The same dynamic occurred with knee socks, bit more in th 1940s. Bobby socks were popular with girls in the 1940s. And when tights appeared , they were only worn by girls. Tube socks in the 1970s were mostly, but not entirely worn by boys.

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Created: 10:11 PM 4/4/2008
Last updated: 5:57 PM 4/16/2014