Figure 1.--Here we see two Russian siblings in 1940. There is pencil writing on the back, but it very feint. They look to be about 3-6 years old. The girl has a hair bow and print dress. The boy weaes a sailor blouse with a squared-off V-collar. Sailor blouses we re relatively for home sewers to produce. The only difficult part was the sailor stripe detailing. Often home sewes would purchase this part. Notice how crudely the stripe detailing is here. Mother must have done this herself. Both children have white socks and strap shoes. And both have their hair done in bangs. Click on the image to see the back.

A Russian reader tells us that sailor suits were still popular in the 1940s and 50s, but had begun to decline in the 1960s. And we see some examples in the photographic record, but we do not have a good idea as to just how popular they were. The images we gave suggests that they were outfits selected by mothers who fathers had comfortable positions in Soviet society, either as Aparatchiks or technical positions. They all look like comfortable city families. The sailor suit was a decidelyb urban fashion. This is interesting because in the West the sailor suit began as a royal/arusticrativ fashion, but became associated with prosperous middle-class families. Both of course were targets of Bolshevik/Sovietr propaganda. It is interesting to note how popular these suits were with the Soviet giverning class. Something we are not entire sure of is to what exten sailor suits were produced in Soviet clothing factories as home to the product of home sewing by mothers with an interest in fashion. World War II, launched by Hitler and Stlkin broke out (Setember 1939). Soviet society was not much affected, until Hitle launched Operation Barbarossa, the massive invasion of the Soviet Union (June 194). As a result the entire economic potential of the Sovuet Union was geared for war. One result was a shortage of conumer produvcts like children's clothing. And this continued well into the post-War period.

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Created: 4:23 PM 12/19/2018
Last updated: 2:36 PM 7/3/2019