I never once saw either of my grandmothers (born 1891 and 1904) wear pants. On regular days or doing housework they wore house-dresses (remember those?). And dressed to the nines for church.
Mom was a teacher and always wore beautiful dresses or suits (with skirts) to teach. She never wore pants either until she got very old and discovered the comfort of sweat pants around the house. Never jeans.
Me? I haven’t wore a dress or skirt since my mother-of-the-bride gown 7 years ago. Or heels.

We were first allowed to wear slacks to school in 6th grade, so that was, given my age, 1970-71 school year. They had to be part of a "pantsuit" ironically, so a Hillary-special had to be involved. Then when I got to Junior High, we could wear any pants, including jeans (this included the hip-hugger, body-suit era). They reached the limit that year when a girl wore a halter-top with jeans. They forbade halter tops. (Those were controversial anyway, as they did not require a bra).

she must have had a hat!

Seeing older movies makes me realize how essential the hats were to both sexes' wardrobes. Then in the 60s, they seem to have just disappeared. I can recall having to have head covering for church as a little kid, but that fell away in the 60s, too.

A European style cap. His head was always covered when he went out.

my grandparents born in the same time frame let the hats go - but then one of the grandmothers had her hair "done" once per week in this poofy style that would be undermined by a hat!

color, wearing them primarily to church.

I recall he got a gift of a cowboy hat the day he was assassinated. He wouldn't put it on.

Hats seem to have almost died out once hairspray was commonplace enough to make it easier for many women to have elaborate up-dos (why wear a hat that would hide it?), and as long hair became more accepted for men (for much the same reason: a hat would hide the flowing locks of a masculine mane).

Thus, the drop-off in the 1960s and 70s.

Originally they required store bought suits, but my Mom pitched a fit. She'd already been battling with the requirement that all girls, including those in the college track (which all four of her daughters) lose a high school credit to Home Ec when boys had no equivalent class. So Mom ranted to the principal about why were we taking a sewing class when they would not let us wear our products to school.

The rules were changed - girls were not allowed to wear jeans - though boys could - but could wear what they made. I was pissed about the jeans rule since men's jeans fit me better than pants tailored for women, plus that meant I had to carry a pair of jeans to school to change to go ride my horse when school let out.

Since we were in Florida, while they called for pants suits the jacket was not really required in our un-air conditioned school. I had a pants suit Mom helped me make that was jean cut pants with a matching vest. I also used that as a outfit to wear at horse shows.

and pantyhose , in my earlier years, but eventually a couple of the more stylishly resilient jackets were reborn as blazers over slacks, and jeans in the office. As far as I was concerned, it was probably 90% about greeting eagerly every opportunity not to have to pull on the p-word. Skirts can be pleasantly breezy.

Bush II days there was a period of talking heads speaking about labor and consumers -- instead of people and citizens. It was not confined to lower working classes either. The feedback must not have been good because that didn't last long.

However, I'm old enough to remember being a waitress in ubiquitous labor-class uniforms of that era of white blouses/shirts and black skirts/slacks, so I absolutely noticed it because this public attitude of America's people being "laborers and consumers" happened to coincide with a big fashion trend to white blouses and black slacks and skirts for working women of all levels, from working to professional. I don't believe for a moment that these trends were completely unrelated, that they didn't and don't reflect similar trickle-down attitudes.

As you can imagine, about that time I was thinking suits might be useful. Now that I live in a rural area and am long out of it, I wonder about what the further trend to casual wear might indicate against today's business contexts.

I like to think it's generally egalitarian and democratic, and of course perhaps to many it is just that. But these days social mobility has become very difficult for many, and we have some very stratified economic classes, particularly the centimillionaire and billionaire classes, so I suspect it might also be anything but.

Happy Easter-day.

Halter tops...mmm...that was this young teen boy’s dream come true!

That movie helped propel the idea that women could wear pants/slacks outside the house.

The other was the Western Serial Movies with All the Female Characters wearing custom Slacks and Levi Jeans.

We had a School walk out in 1955 over Girls wearing Jeans/Slacks instead of Skirts or Dresses. That also included Guys wearing shirts with more than one button unbuttoned. Proud to say,we won that war. Dress codes were put in writing as a after effect. Proud to say,only got one week of Home Room Detention for that uprising.

Damn those were the days.

I decided I could wear whatever the heck I wanted to. Now I wear long dresses. No fashion sense at all.

Of course we still had to wear skirts to school. Bermudas were an unisex thing.
In retrospect, it was the beginning of the move to pants. A few years later we were wearing
jeans and slacks regularly.

Progress is slow.

had to wrestle with cow's and pigs.

Pants suits weren't accepted at IBM until mid 70s. But as a female manager, my suits had skirts.

Their rules. She thought the habits alientated people.

It is kind of funny, I guess, and might seem regressive, but to me it isn't. It's all about choice, and with choice, one is free to wear either. To signal that one has chosen religious life through dress is just as ok as wearing a uniform.

As for the skirts vs. pants controversy, I think it'll only be true equality when skirts and dresses are considered as unisex as pants are now. It's always OK for women to strive to emulate men, but we can see the misogyny in the fact that it is not socially acceptable for men to emulate women - be that in dress, behavior, or toys. When boys can play with dolls, show all emotions and not just anger, choose nurturing professions, stay home with the kids if they want and wear dresses as easily as pants - that's when we will know that equality's here. It isn't yet.

After a career of wearing pants both professionally she wears skirts and dresses exclusively to work and often times when recreating.

Last year we went to France and Switzerland and she took skirts, a black dress and a couple pairs of slacks.

I certainly had nothing to do with this change. When asked she just says she thinks she looks nicer in skirts and in our hot climate finds them more comfortable.

Just kind of odd she changed so much but I do agree with her. She looks pretty hot in a skirt. ❤️

However, the "office uniform" requires pantyhose worn with the skirt and usually heels or dressy flat shoes. That's where I draw the line! Wearing pantyhose is agony in hot weather.

When you went to France and Switzerland you probably saw most of the younger women wearing jeans.
That's what they do now, unless it's a dressy occasion. They dress like us most of the time.

We kept a skirt or dress handy to slip on when we left our dorm rooms to go to supper.

caused all sorts of controversy for wearing slacks on "The Dick Van Dyke" show.

I agree, this seemed to be one of those changes ushered in during the '60s.

We also wore skirts and jeans and pants and dresses — but it was all popular, fashionable attire as in something like Seventeen magazine. We never dressed formally unless it was for a prom or something.

I should add that my grandmother wore pants casually (at home or doing informal activities) in the 40s and my mother wore pants (pedal pusher types) in the 60s everywhere.

Throughout that time, girls were required to wear dresses or skirts to school. It was a hard and fast rule. That seems so strange to think about today.

I'm pretty sure the women who worked in factory jobs (and construction) had to wear pants even in those days. Maybe they switched back to skirts on their own time, but on the job they would have required pants.

she wore business suits with skirts to the office but she wore pants around the neighborhood, in the summer, etc. My mother wore/wears them all the time as a teenager and adult woman (she wore those pedal pusher pants to school starting when she was 9-10 ish and shorts at home). We all lived in Southern California though...

At that time, she always wore jeans to work. She was short so she rolled the bottoms, and used to catch the metal punch outs from her machine in the folds.

At school, about that time, we little girls used to wear jeans under our dresses in the winter to keep warm on the school bus. We would usually keep them on during the school day, but heaven forbid we would just wear pants and a shirt!

In high school, about 1960-1964, we could wear slacks on Friday, but no jeans.

In college, we could not wear pants to dinner, but they were okay for breakfast and lunch.

When I started working, pants were not allowed. When pantsuits were created, they were given a provisional okay, as long as the jacket covered the butt.

By the mid 1970, we could even wear jeans to work.

Both my grandmas ordinarily wore pants as I remember.

Looking at old photographs, World War II marks the change.

One of my grandmas was a welder in the shipyards. Remarkably she kept working when the war ended and until she retired with a pension. 'Fifties suburban housewife wasn't her style. Many women were forced out of good jobs when the "boys returned home." She must have been lucky, tenacious, and talented.

I hate heels, too. The last pair I had went in the donation bin about 30 years ago.

It’s all skirts for her.

I graduated high school in Indiana in 1968 and it was still not ok to wear slacks to school. Yet, jeans and slacks were the norm at IU when I started in the same year. (Things may have changed on the coasts earlier.)

I know the suits I had for work in the mid 1970s, mostly had skirts -- though I had a few that came with slacks instead or in addition to. Both were acceptable. I was friends with a woman, who told me and others of being one of the first women to wear slacks to Bell Labs in Murray Hill - I think some time in the late 60s. She was physicist and part of the technical staff. It was years before the administrative staff had the same freedom.

There were churches where you could feel uncomfortable in that time frame wearing slacks at the same period.

It might have been as early as the 1950s. My mom did wear slacks and even shorts as a young wife and mother. While she would wear a dress when she went to church or even to visit relatives, there were many times that she wore slacks around town. (Thinking about it, this was true even for very prominent people - there were many pictures of the Kennedys sailing etc where Jackie wore slacks. Many were pre 1960.)

wearing a dress in the early sixties. There was a neighbor man sitting on his back steps. The wind kicked up really hard and her dress just went all the way up. She was absolutely mortified. Neighbor didn’t say a word. That was the last time she wore a dress except for Sunday services.

I haven't worn a dress or skirt in DECADES

My mom mostly had me in pants etc. I remember a friend telling me their father would not let them wear pants to school, or maybe anywhere. I can’t remember what I wore mostly to school now or what the rules were. In England I wore a uniform, a dark skirt and white blouse. Now I prefer maxi skirts cause they are so comfy( loose skirts really are more comfortable than anything) but more recently I also started wearing comfy sweats and pants again etc. NYDJ are the only jeans to wear. Comfort is very important to me due to health conditions, no more heels 👠 ever but I stopped that years ago, I still don’t understand why women do that to themselves 😜