The New York herald., 1921-11-20
SHORT SKIRTS, AID TO HEALTH, MAY DEFY Fash
BY MARTHA CONAN.

BY MARTHA CONAN.
the width of the skirt, tennis
- racquet decides the type Of corset
woman shall wear while butterfly dive
dsposes of all discussion as to the rroprietv
of a one piece bathing suit. Such is the
Importance of comfort when one is engaged
in outdoor sports.
These athletic activities of womer, which
have become popular within the last decade
and half, have revolutionized the feminine
silhouette and changed bonds into freedom.
No women in the world are less hampered
by their clothes than the American women,
and there is no other country where outdoc'
sports are so generally INDUCED in a. here
Followers of Sport May Defy
Paris Dress Edict This Year
So devoted have sports loving women be.
come to their comfortably short skirts that
when Paris recently decided that feminine
ankles were to be shrouded in folds of fash
ionable material American women openly
rebeled They declared they just wouldn't
go back to long skirts, or even 20 skirts
much longer than they had been wearing.
Not one of the dozens interviewed on the
subject of whether American womanhood
was again to become adjunct of the Street
Cleaning Department and help sweep up
curbs and sidewalks favored the ankle length
skirt And invariably each based her objec
ton on the discomfort such skirt entails
when going up and down elevated or subway
steps or boarding a surface car
Sport fashions have been accepted as the
daytime dress for the business ano profess
sional woman. They all know the comfort
of sport suit and the bloomers and bras
siere and pliable corset worn underneath.
and to support them in their determination
to cling to comfort for working hours they
call attention to the trim appea ,snce OF
women who dress in this style
Physicians and athletic instructors stand
by them in their refusal to permit any rad-
cal change in the favored sport dress. Health
Commissioner Copeland heartily approves the
short skirt for everyday wear, both for looks
and sanitary attributes. So does DR.. Thomas
d. Wood, athletic director Of Teachers Col
lege. and for the same reasons Both de
clared the sensible dress of to-day about as
sensible as ever had been achieved by the
combined aid of those who design fashions
and those who them.
An act of Congress. which permitted the
late DR. Mary Walker to wear male attire
because she considered it more comfortable
and better adapted to her activities than the
long. wide, harcloth stiffened skirts and
leg o. mutton sleeves in vogue In the heydey
of her career never quite accustomed or
reconcilsd the public to seeing a woman
dressed in mems trousers Yet the recent
appearance OF young women wearing knck-
erbockers as they stroed down Fifth avenue
caused scarcely ripple of excitement among
the thousands Of afternoon shoppers. Sports
have accomplished wonders in the meta
znorphosis Of feminine clothes.
At Last Men Are Used to
Seeing Women in Trousers
If the world hadn't grown accustomed to
seeing women riding astride In the neatest
OF hreeches and coats, or hiking over the
country roads in khaki knickerbockers, or
skiing in brothers army togs. or playing
golf in the trimmest of bifurcated tweeds.
there probably would have been more necks
craned to see the fair pedestrians they
promenade. We are getting used to common
sense In dress, though the common sense is
by no means the ugly thing 1t formerly was.
The Rainy Daisies" as the members of
that club which instigated the fashion of
the short skirts are called, gave a vivid
picture of what New York city's streets
looked like twenty-five years ago, when the
feminine members of society were unwill-
ingly enlisted in the street cleaning job.
The little movement started then bv a group
of women shocked the public more perhaps
than cigarette smoking skirts worn up
to the knees. And all they wanted was tbs
public's approval of fashion that lifted
hens just tiny bit above the ground
Did they get it? Ask any of that little
band of Rainy Daisies" who trotted forth
in wet weather and in snow and even In
sunshine wearing skirts that measured ex-
actly four inches from the ground They
will tell you that instead of approval they
were jeered at by men and women small
boys threw stones at them and society
women drew aside their own trailing skirts
as IL there might be contamination in the
very presence of dress so shocking thar
1t showed the wearer walking on perfectly
good pair of feet instead OF on stills or
wheels.