More pictures to match up with books!
I will be away for the next 10 days: no new posts.
Last
time I went away I cheekily set my lovely readers to work: I published a few of the
pictures I had tucked away in my files, so far unused on the blog, and asked
them to suggest books to suit. This was
such a success, that – as I am away again – I am going to try the experiment
again.
I have a file called Looking for the Right Book –
general illos that I loved enough to save, but was not sure where to use them. So here
are a few of them. Please tell me in the comments if you can think of a great
book to go with. Thank you, and see you back here soon.
[Special note for blogfriend Shay, if she's reading: one of these pics I thought on rediscovering 'Bet Shay will say she has made, or would make, this, OR she will have the perfect book]
I love the fact that you save these, Moira! Even if they don't end up matching a book, they're great. Have a safe trip!
ReplyDeleteHmm. The last one calls out Mitfords to me. Not a specific book., but perhaps Diana, Nancy and Pam meet in town for lunch and a matinee.
ReplyDeleteSusan D
I was thinking some of Harriet Vane's friends (a bit lower on the social ladder, though, so you may be right, especially given the leopard coat).
DeleteThose look like wartime clothes which means Diana probably wouldn't make it to lunch, what with being in prison and all ...
DeleteSovay
The second one reminds me of Lost Lorrenden by Mabel Esther Allan. Heroine obsessed by painting of outdoor dining at country home.
ReplyDeleteI confess to a pair of beach pajamas but Lord -- that was a long time ago!
ReplyDeleteI suppose 'lounge wear' has taken their place.
DeleteI didn't mean that you were in lounge wear Shay, but generally!
DeleteThe first picture is probably American, but it looks like a setting from one of Marjorie Allingham’s London books.
ReplyDeleteNerys
For som reason my first thought was Dorothy Sayers, so we are obviously thinking along the same lines,
DeleteThe woman in red seems to be ice skating which reminds me of a Mrs Olyphant book, but the time period is wrong. And Little Women of course, but again, wrong time period and Amy probably wouldn't be wearing red (except maybe long johns).
ReplyDeleteThe high-class-outerwear ladies might be from one of Elizabeth Daly's mysteries, which sometimes were set among the upper crust of NYC.
ReplyDeleteI will think of some books, but I am intrigued by the advert on the side of the building in the first photo…. Free instruction in domestic economy! I wonder what constituted domestic economy when this was taken!
ReplyDeleteIt looks like part of a well-meant (but potentially quite patronising) Depression-era campaign to help the families of the unemployed make their Welfare payments go further.
DeleteSovay
I think domestic economy was an earlier name for what we used to call home economics. The Syracuse organization and others like it were older than the Depression, based on legislation from early in the century. They seemed to be an effort to improve quality of life through information and demonstrations. An article on archive.org went into some detail about the home bureaus, including this about Syracuse:
Delete"...In Syracuse, N. Y., the home bureau organization in 1924 was cooperating with 27 other organized agencies in its work for better homes. The Syracuse Home Bureau Association is a branch of the Onondaga County Farm and Home Bureau Association and is connected with the State college of agriculture. The executive committee is elected by members of the association, and has headquarters at the thrift kitchen, where the food and clothing laboratories are maintained."
Website is https://ia801902.us.archive.org/2/items/homedemonstratio43ward/homedemonstratio43ward.pdf
Speaking of domestic matters, I was surprised at the ladies doing their housework in those "wrap" garments and stiletto heels!
DeleteWhat an interesting article - thanks for the link! They seem to have similar aims to the Women's Institute in Britain, but on a far larger and more professional scale.
DeleteI too was surprised by the trousered overalls for housework - I suspect this pattern is from the US and didn't make it across the Atlantic in the 1930s. Can't see the UK servant-employing classes putting up with such garments on their housemaids, or even their daily cleaning women, and I'm not sure that women who did their own housework would have taken the leap into trousers either - my working-class grandmother and great-grandmother never wore them.
Sovay
No appropriate book coming to mind yet but the Thirties beach pyjama pic is intriguing; the bell-bottomed style is very familiar but I've never come across anything like the barrel-shaped ones that gather at the ankles.
ReplyDeleteSovay
The barrel-shaped style looks as if it had air pumped into it, it's so billowing.
Delete