Greek maidens playing ball in the Oregon State University May Day Pageant, 1920s
Margarete Schütte-Lihotsky, Austrian, 1897-2000, Frankfurt Kitchen, 1926-1930, Kitchen cabinetry and stove, Gift of funds from Regis Foundation, 2004.195
The Frankfurt Kitchen, part of an ambitious citywide project to create affordable housing after WWI, was extremely influential throughout Europe into the 1930s and still stands as the epitome of “scientific” organization for the domestic workspace.City Architect Ernst May hired Schütte-Lihotzky, one of the first female architects in Austria, to design a rationally planned kitchen for 10,000 integrated housing units over a four-year period. She analyzed key principles for household design and labor, and positioned each kitchen element carefully, minimizing unnecessary steps as well as providing labor-saving devices and increasing physical comfort.
The kitchen’s many innovative features included integrated units, continuous work surfaces, a worktable for preparing food under a large window adjacent to the sink (both set at a convenient height for use while seated), as well as storage bins with handles and spouts, an adjustable ceiling light, a movable stool, a concealed pass-through, drop-down ironing board, and cabinetry painted blue, supposedly to repel flies.
Jennifer Komar Olivarez
Associate Curator, Decorative Arts, Textiles, and Sculpture
Minneapolis Institute of Arts
http://artsmia.org/
Sigma Kappa women in fur coats, Madison, Wisconsin ca. 1922.
via: UW-Madison Archives by way of University of Wisconsin Digital Collections
Ada Blackjack aboard her rescue ship, 1923.
In 1921, 23 year old Alaska Native Ada Blackjack joined an expedition to Wrangel Island north of Siberia as a cook and seamstress. Ada and four men chosen for their expertise in science and geography survived on the island for over a year before rations ran out. At that point, three men tried to cross the frozen Chukchi Sea for food while Ada and Lorne Knight, an ailing member of the group, stayed behind. Lorne died in April 1923. Ada was rescued in August 1923. The three men who left to seek help were never heard from again. Ada lived to age 85, living a quiet life and raising two sons.
The photo above was found on Jennifer Niven’s webpage. She is the author of Ada BlackJack: A True Story of Survival in the Arctic, the digital edition of which is current $3.03 on Amazon.
June 13, 1922: Veterans Bureau employee Viola LaLonde and Census Bureau employee Elizabeth Van Tuyl pose beside a Ford automobile before making their cross-country drive from Washington, DC to San Francisco. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
Keep in mind, these women crossed the country before the construction of a national highway system. Forget Econolodges and Denny’s restaurants, they packed their own fuel and food, sleeping in the car.
Eisenhower drove cross country on the Lincoln Highway in 1919 as part of an army convoy which took four months to cross the country. The contrast between that experience and his experience driving on the Autobahn during World War II led to Eisenhower’s proposal for a national highway system.
(via downlookingup)
Recreo (Recreation) by Petrona Viera, circa 1924.
Museu Nacional de Artes Visuais (MNAV), Montevideo, Uruguay.
The daughter of Uruguayan President Feliciano Viera, Petrona is considered the first female professional painter in Uruguay. She was part of the Planismo (flat-ism) movement of austere lines and bright colors. Unlike other artists of her period, Petrona never studied in Europe. Instead she worked at home with instructors such as Guillermo Laborde. Deaf from the age of two, Petrona found another way to express herself in art.
The figures in the painting above are playing “Martín Pescador,” a game similar in mechanics but not lyrics to “London Bridge is Falling Down.”
The first girl students in Cairo university by Kodak Agfa on Flickr.
نعيمة الايوبي. فاطمة سالم. زهيرة عبد العزيز. سهير القلماوي. فاطمة فهمى . سيدات مصر . نفتخر بهم
Anna Roosevelt, German Shepard “Chief of the Mohawk,” and Franklin Roosevelt at the seventh annual dog show of the Washington Kennel Club, 1920.
In addition to working in public relations and journalism, Anna served as an aide to her father, accompanying him to the Yalta Conference in 1945. During JFK’s administration, Anna served on both the Citizen’s Advisory Council on the Status of Women and the President’s Commission for the Observance of Human Rights.
Six young women carrying a banner advertising a meeting of the Ruth Hanna McCormick Volunteers in Chicago, Illinois. The women are: Mrs. Elizabeth Drake, Helen Farnum, Mrs.Edwin Hersey, Glee Viles, and Jane Schuttler.
Chicago Daily News photo, 1928.
Ruth Hanna McCormick served in the US House of Representatives from 1929-1931.
The Girl Scouts “Little House”
The “Little House” was set up in the early 1920s in Washington, DC to serve as the headquarters for demonstrating the home-making activities of the Girl Scouts.
First Lady Lou Hoover was closely involved with the Girl Scouts. In 1930 Mrs. Hoover commissioned a New York craftsman to make, at her expense, an exact reproduction doll house of the original “Little House,” including dolls dressed in Scout uniforms and even the paper on the walls. See it here.
Happy 100th birthday to the Girl Scouts of America!
It is still Girl Scout Cookie season, find cookies here.
Madam CJ Walker Advertisement, 1920.
A short video about the life of Madam CJ Walker, America’s first female self-made millionaire, can be seen here.
