Bloomers, bicycles, and old books—oh my! It’s an all new year, and an all new season of The Gibson Girl Review kicks off with long-overdue book we’ve been wanting to share since the podcast began: George F. Hall’s didactic diatribe, A Study in Bloomers (1895). Amy and Jacinta take turns praising and bashing this unusual story of a weary preacher who falls for a bloomer-wearing, bicycle-riding “New Woman,” and take a deeper look at the differences between this “New Woman” and the iconic Gibson Girl.
Plus the history segment is back by popular demand! This season, it’s all about the real-life women who modeled for Charles Dana Gibson’s illustrations, and who better to start with than the one woman who just might be able to claim the “original Gibson Girl” title once and for all—Gibson’s little sister, Josephine.
This episode contains a bonus Spoiler Room episode, available exclusively to our Dana’s Club members.
Topics and shout-outs in this episode include: Charles Dana Gibson, Gibson Girls, the Gilded Age, the Progressive Era, gilded fiction, Josephine Gibson Knowlton, Daniel Knowlton, Life Magazine, Irene Langhorne Gibson, the Mafia, the Interstate Commerce Commission, Chevrolet, Harvard, The Great War, feminism vs. femininity, The Woman Question, Mr. Darcy, America’s Daughter, A Study in Scarlet, Sherlock Holmes, Miss Bayle’s Romance, Elsie Dinsmore, Swiss Family Robinson, Didacticism, Ben-Hur, bimetalism, divorce, prohibition, dress reform, dietetics, athleticism, Paul Leicester Ford, Shop Early for Christmas, the Bicycle Craze, the Bloomer Agitation, the 1893 World’s Fair, and land speculation.