Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1885-09-04
CORSETS.
Why Stays Arc Considered Injurious for
GROWING Girls.

Why stays Arc Considered Injurious for
Growing Girls.
Foreign authorities are rather more
severe in their dress restrictions than
are our own fashion writers, and the
subject of healthy dress for growing
girls is deemed by the foreign press of
greater Importance than is hygienic
dress for ladies, for, says one sensible
writer, dress reform must begin with
the children of to-day, who will be the
women of the next generation.
The abolition of stays appears to be
one of the first requirements, for, says
one. if they are not stiff they are UNI
yielding, and thus not adaptable to the
changing proportions Of the young
body, which is straight down alike;
hence if the stays are loose they slip
down and press on the pelvis, crushing
the surrounding soft parts and possibly
deforming the bony structure. which
during childhood is cartilaginous and
easily bent, thus creating a source of
misery for the girls future. Since the
stays thus tend to slip down mothers
are inclined to tighten them somewhat
Just to give them a little grip, you
know"-and in this way the evil Of
tight lacing is initiated; or shoulder
straps are added for the purpose of
keeping them in place, and these give
rise to STOPPING, by dragging on the
shoulders, and not infrequently to
curvature of the spine.
1--WE never lace; just see how. loose
our corsets are" is the constant cry of
young ladies whose pale faces show
the compression of years. Let them try
the experiment of going in sundress''
for one month and mark the result
see the wonderful expansion of waist
and chest.
Perhaps girls are not so much to
blame for this as mothers, for the too
common custom of pinching in the
waists of growing girls has most prob
ably arisen from the difficulty of keep
ing their clothes from slipping down.
And again, girls often lace their corsets
and wear them for months without
changing the strings, so while the
bodies grow bigger the stays do not
and compression takes place. An
inelastic corset etfectually binders the
gradual enlargement of the body of a
growing girl and presses on her soft
bones like a wise. At no period Of life
is the pressure on any part of the body
so terribly injurious as during the
period of growth, for not only are the
bones soft and easily deformable, but
every organ of the body has its duty of
development to perform, and the sde-
velopment is cramped and hindered by
external compression. As pressure on
any part is injurious, mothers must
see that it will not be right simply to
remove the pressure of the clothes
from the waist and suspend theirwhole
| weight from the shoulders, as is fire.
quently done, for this is a cause of
STOPPING, of poking forward of the
head and of spinal trouble. The
weight of the clothes should be evenly
distributed, and this result can be &C
complished by wearing union gar
ments, fitted rather closely to the
figure, or by supporting pctticoats and
drawers to a well-ttting bodice. If
we want our children to have erect
frames, clothed with firm muscles, we
must see to it that they have healthy
dress, a liberal amount of physical ex.
ercise and well-prepared, nourishing,
plain food.-Phaladekphsa Times.