Fashion Question? Whoopee Booties - The Style Success of the Season

Do you think one of your ancestors might have worn these in 1929?

[Sears Roebuck catalog, Fall 1929 - from the witness2fashion blog on Wordpress]

I found this image on one of my favorite blogs: witness2fashion which is a great resource, especially for "ordinary" clothing styles of the 1920s and 30s.*

I can picture my paternal grandmother Letta Estella Porter (1901-1974) donning a pair, though it doesn't appear that's what she was wearing in this snapshot taken in Dallas, Texas, on August 18th of that year.

[Courtesy of James E. Turnbull III]

*The blog also covers clothing styles of other decades as well.


© 2018 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

From the Probate Files: Peter Worden II - New Plymouth, New England, 1680 (Part III)

When the elder Peter Worden left everything including "all my lands Leases tenaments with goods movable and unmovable in ye Towne of Clayton in ye County of Lankester" to his only son Peter Worden II (who accompanied his father to Massachusetts in about 1638) both men would have known what that property was and had some idea of its worth. 

However by 1680 no one seems to have been able to judge what value to put on the property described as "all my estate in old England both land and other estate that came by my wife*" in the Peter II's will. 

["Massachusetts, Plymouth County, Probate Records, 1633-1967," images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-997D-V3D1?cc=2018320&wc=M6BX-F29%3A338083801 : 20 May 2014), Wills 1633-1686 vol 1-4 > image 516 of 616; State Archives, Boston.]

Item an Interest in house and land and mony in old England
not knowing what it may be worth                                              xxx--00---0
Item an house and land both upland and meddows
in the Towne of Yarmouth                                                            500--00--0


Peter II's oldest son Samuel Worden was the main beneficiary of his father's will and he and his mother Mary acted as executors of his estate, giving their oath that the inventory** was true.

["Massachusetts, Plymouth County, Probate Records, 1633-1967," images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:3QS7-997D-V3D1?cc=2018320&wc=M6BX-F29%3A338083801 : 20 May 2014), Wills 1633-1686 vol 1-4 > image 516 of 616; State Archives, Boston.]

This  2i of March 1680
Samuell Worden and Mary Worden the Relict of the
said Peter Worden maid oath to the truth of this inventory
Before mee John Freeman Assistant?;                   John Miller
                                                                               John Hall Junior:
                                                                               Paul Sears: ????


*Although there are claims made that Peter II's wife Mary's maiden name was Winslow or Seares, I'm not comfortable with either name. In any case, we don't know what property in England she had brought to the marriage.
**I will cover the complete inventory of Peter II in a later post.


© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

You Can Buy a Replica of the Sears Catalog on Amazon.com

No big surprise here, isn't almost everything now on Amazon?  Just seems kinda meta, since the Sears Roebuck catalog was the Amazon of its day.

Cyber Monday and Cyber Week sales enticements got me looking at Amazon the past few days.  So much stuff, so little money!

Being genealogically oriented, I naturally wondered what shopping was like in the past and thought about Sears (and about Montgomery Ward, it's older rival, both original to Chicago) and it's historical importance for the mail order industry which lead to the ultimate development of online retail giants like Amazon.  Sears Roebuck catalogs had an amazing selection (available at Ancestry's Historic Catalogs of Sears, Roebuck and Co., 1896-1993) of goods available to American consumers:

In a lot of ways warehouses don't change although the technology that Amazon uses for quick fulfillment was impossible back then, of course.

Sears Roebuck Hardware Department (Fall 1897 catalog).

Clothing Department (Fall 1897 Catalog)

Department of Boots, Shoes, and Rubbers (Fall 1897 Catalog).

Amazon warehouse (location unknown) (Robert Galbraith/Reuters image) from Business Insider's article "See what it's like inside Amazon's massive warehouses."

Dallas Amazon.com fulfillment center (from Amazon.com fulfillment center bringing 1,500 jobs to Dallas)

There were pages of testimonials published in the catalog (Fall 1897).  Sears controlled the message in this case to their advantage, as to be expected.

Amazon not only has a space for testimonials and reviews (one of their most compelling features in my opinion), but doesn't control the message, as evidenced by the tongue-in-cheek critical review of the 1897 Sears Roebuck Catalog.  We live in a much more amusing time!

© 2016 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.