Figure 1.-- Here we see thee siblings at the beach. Motice the pear in the background. The snapshot is undated, but looks like the 1850s to us. The boy seejs to be wearing his school clothes. The older girl looks to be wearing a romper suit, but aeader tells us that the may have tucked the hem of her dress into her knickers.

We do not yet have much gender information on rompers. English readers have not commented to any extent on the topic. We have no information on the 19th century. We note some English children wearing rompers in the early-20th century. think early rompers in England were worn by both boys and girls. These were mostly pre-school children. We note a girl wearing rompers for paddling on the beach in the inte-War era. Older girls might also wear them. We are not yet sure if romper suits were worn for school gym class in England, but bloomers certainly were. By the 1960s we see school-age girls wearing rompers. A good example is an unidentified girl with a swim club group. We are not sure if she is wearing her eomper suit as a swimsuit or after swiming, but it seens ti be swimsuit. This was appaently a swimsuit, but would not have been very good for competitive swimming. Hopefully our British readers will be able to throw some light on this topic.

Chronology

Our chronology of English girls rompers is very limited. Amelia Jenks Bloomer was an American women's rights and temperance advocate. Even though she did not create the women's clothing reform style known as bloomers, her name became associated with it because of her early and strong advocacy (1850s). We know little about bloomers, but they were never worm to any extent by American or Europeam girls to any extent. There was one exception--girls gym suits. We begin to see a substantial expansion of girls' education. And with this came the question as to how girls should dress fot gym (physical education) and sports. The primary answer became middy bloues and bloomer pants. This evolved into romper suits. We are not sure as to the relationship between bloomers and romper suits that we see children wearing in the inter-War era, but there must be a relationship of some kind. In France only boys wore rompers. In America and Britain it seems to be more of a child'garment without any gender connotstions, at least for younger childrn. We note some English children wearing rompers in the early-20th century, after World War I. It may have begun earlier, but we hav no photographic evidence of that yet. Rompers eem to have been worn or beach play, but weare still working on usage. Rompers continued to worn after World War II into the 1950s, but we rarely see then by the 60s, although our archive is limited and we are still working on the chronology.

Usage

A lot of the English rompers we have found seem associated with beach and pool wear. Our archive is, however, too limited to draw any firm conclusions about rompers. We note a girl wearing rompers for paddling on the beach in the inter-War era (figire 1). Quite a few of the romperimges we have found for both boys or girls seem to be bechwear. . We are not yet sure if romper suits were worn for school gym class in England, but bloomers certainly were. Romper suits were widely worn by teenage girls for gym classes in America. This seems to also be the case in England, but we do not yet have much information.

Age

The few images we have found of English children wearing rompers are mostly pre-school children. We have found some images of older girls, including teenagers wearing rompers. This seems to have begun at about the same time rompers first appeared. Only younger boys wore rompers, but teenage girls wore them. We have no idea how common this was in the 1920s. By the 1960s we see school-age girls wearing rompers. A good example is an unidentified girl with a swim club group. We are not sure if she is wearing her romper suit as a swimsuit or after swiming, but it seens to be swimsuit. This was appaently a swimsuit, but would not have been very good for competitive swimming. Perhaps she just put it on after the competition. American girls wore similar romper outfits.

Tucking in Dresses

An English reader writes, "I was looking at your photo of the three children, and the older girl in 'rompers'. I am wondering if she is actually wearing a dress and has tucked the hem in her knickers to prevent it from getting wet. My sister and her friends in the 1940s abd 50s often did this. Attached is a picture of a girl similarly dressed (in red square). It is from HBCs page on Gordon Beach, Gravesend, London." This certainly is a possibility. It must be remembered that people in the 1940s and 0s, especially children, had much more limited wardrobes than is the case today.