Figure 1.--Here we see an unidentified American girl wearing rompers in 1912. Notice her brother wears a tunic suit. Image courtesy of the BP collection. |
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We note quite a number of younger children wearing rompers in the 1910s. We see rompers made to size 8. We do not know if older children wore them. This may have begun in the late 1900s, but we do not have any dated images from the 1900s. As children at this age look so similar, it is very difficut to tell if the children are boys or girls. Both boys and girls were wearing them in the 1910s. It is not alawys possible to descrimate gender in the photographs, but we have catalog listings identifying boys, girls, and children rompers from the 1910s. A goof example is the Best Spring-Summer 1912 catalog. There was a separate page for girl rompers.
We are not entirely sure about popularity. They seem more popular for boys than girls. Thus it is very difficult building a chronology of girls wearing rompers. One popular related style was the bloomer gymsuits for older highschool girls. These evolved into one-piece romper gym suits that were widely worn by American highschool girls for gym through the 1950s instead of the short pants gym suits that boys wore. We are not sure when this convention began, but know it was wide spread in the 1910s.
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