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Three photographs of Mother Jones with each becoming less pixelated until the final image is clear.

America’s Best Made-Up Person

On the transformation of Mary Harris into Mother Jones.
Person in a red veil.

Connecting with Trans History, Rebellion, and Joy, in “Compton’s 22”

Transgender people's reactions to watching oral histories of the legacy of a 1966 riot in the Tenderloin that was nearly lost to history.
Women wearing hot pants.

The Great Leg Show!

Hot pants served as a sartorial riposte to the fashion industry’s relentless campaign for the midi.
Two American soldiers in UCP uniforms with an Iraqi man in the background.

Universal Failure

Universal Camouflage Pattern became a symbol of an unpopular war. Today, it’s being reappraised by those too young to remember the invasion of Iraq.
Photo of a female jogger drinking water out of a pink metal water bottle.
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Your New Year's Resolution to Drink More Water Has a History

Our water bottle obsession speaks to deeper historical trends.
A turntable and records.

What’s Old is New Again (and Again): On the Cyclical Nature of Nostalgia

Retro was not the antithesis to the sub- and countercultural experiments of the 1960s, it grew directly out of them.
Different Barbie designs sitting around a table.

Decoding Barbie’s Radical Pose

The “Barbie” movie glides over the history of dolls as powerful cultural objects.
Collage of baseball caps

The History of the Baseball Cap

The long, strange, history of the baseball cap.
Illustrated J. Crew cover, showing a blonde white couple wearing "preppy' clothing sitting by a river; a young man's khaki shorts, boat shoes, and school books on a campus; a crew team on the water. Illustration by Nada Hayek.

J. Crew and the Paradoxes of Prep

By mass-marketing social aspiration, the brand toed the line between exclusivity and accessibility—and established prep as America’s visual vernacular.
Graphic novel page depicting Harlem's Black nightlife.

A Graphic Novel Rediscovers Harlem’s Glamorous Female Mob Boss

Stephanie St. Clair, who gained notoriety as a criminal entrepreneur and a fashion icon, was a powerful Black woman able to wrest control in a world run by men.
Twentieth-century porcelain dolls made by German company Armand Marseille

How Porcelain Dolls Became the Ultimate Victorian Status Symbol

Class-obsessed consumers found the cold, hard and highly breakable figurines irresistible
Alcorn State University's Origional Golden Girls.

Sass And Shimmer: The Dazzling History Of Black Majorettes And Dance Lines

Beginning in the 1960s, young Black majorettes and dance troupes created a fascinating culture. This is the story of how they did it.
Photograph of woman in black mourning clothes and pearls

The Elitist History of Wearing Black to Funerals

Today, mourning attire is subdued and dutiful. It wasn’t always that way.
New York City sidewalk full of people wearing hats.

Hat Havoc in the Big Apple

The Hat Riots of 1922 show how arbitrary, elite rules can spur civil unrest.
Photo of officer candidates of the Women's Army Auxiliary Corps start off their day with a calisthenics drill wearing fatigue uniforms at Fort Des Moines on Aug. 8, 1942. (AP)
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The Military Has Long Had Ties With The Fashion Industry

The new Army bra is the latest chapter in a longtime partnership.
Vintage photograph of two little girls sitting on a mid-century television set.

The Lost Art of Striking a Pose With Your TV Set

In midcentury America, the machine itself became a character.
A collection of flags, games, and printed matter from the Civil War

Patriotism and Consumerism in the Civil War

For a burgeoning consumer society, store-bought flags and bonnets offered proof that commercialism could go hand in hand with heartfelt emotion.
Drawing of ladies wearing "lightning rod hats" ca. 1778.

Electrical Fashions

From the light-bulb dress to galvanic belts, electrified clothing offered a way to experience and conquer a mysterious and vigorous force.
Floral wallpaper, c. 1875. Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum Collection, gift of Harvey Smith.

Flower Power

On the women who kickstarted the ecological restoration movement in America.
Photographs of Helen “Ned” Dutcher and Edith Joiner. Both are resting against a set of bicycles. Taken April 25, 1897.

How Bicycles Liberated Women in Victorian America

Cycling culture offered individual women, as well as couples, greater freedom in daily life.
“Mrs. Lavin coming out of shul in fur,” 1952.

At the Lower East Side Passover Parade, Immigrants Created New American Identities

Some accounts suggest that the Passover Parade was even more glamorous than its famous counterpart, the Easter Parade.
Caesar, William McKinley, and Trump sporting three different comb-overs throughout history.

The Rise, Flop and Fall of the Comb-Over

Balding has been the constant scourge of man since the beginning of time, and for millennia, our best solution was the comb-over.
A 1920s undergarment shop, in black and white.

Bringing Down the Bra

Since the 19th century, women have abandoned restrictive undergarments while pursuing social and political freedom.
Section of a page from Hannah Alspaugh’s fabric scrapbook.

This Fabric Scrapbook Offers a Surprisingly Emotional Portrait of 19th-Century Life

Back when most people made their clothes, one swatch could carry many stories.

Why Martha Washington's Life Is So Elusive to Historians

A gown worn by the first First Lady reveals a dimension of her nature that few have been aware of.
Union suit on clothesline

How 19th-Century Activists Ditched Corsets for One-Piece Long Underwear

Before it was embraced by men, the union suit, or 'emancipation suit,' was worn by women pushing for dress reform.
Photo of Halston, Bianca Jagger, Jack Haley, Jr., Liza Minnelli and Andy Warhol at a New Years Eve party at Studio 54

How Fashion Was Forever Changed by “The Gay Plague”

An oral history with 25 fashion luminaries, highlighting a previously untold history of the AIDS crisis.

Lamb to the Slaughter

The rise and fall of the Brooks Brothers name.
Cartoon that shows a man struggling to shake a woman's hand because of her wide skirt.

Lampooning Political Women

For as long as women have battled for equitable political representation in America, those battles have been defined by images.

“All the World’s a Harem”

How masks became gendered during the 1918–1919 Flu Pandemic.

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