More menstrual and everyday underpants
Japanese, early 20th century - "Sanitary Bloomers," 1922 (ad from Sears, Roebuck
catalog, U.S.A.) - various underpants, 1928
(page from Sears, Roebuck catalog) - step-in, Hickory,
1928 (ad from Vanity Fair magazine, U.S.A.) - first Sears everyday
panties (nonmenstrual), 1935 (ad from Sears, Roebuck catalog) - various
panties (and belts), 1946-47 (page from Sears,
Roebuck catalog) - various panties, 1960s (part
of Personal Digest, Modess, U.S.A.) - SheShells
panties (1970s)
See ads for menarche-education booklets:
Marjorie May's Twelfth Birthday (Kotex, 1932),
Tampax tampons (1970, with Susan Dey), Personal
Products (1955, with Carol Lynley), and German o.b.
tampons (lower ad, 1981)
And read Lynn Peril's series about these
and similar booklets!
Read the full text of the 1935 Canadian edition
of Marjorie May's Twelfth Birthday, probably identical to the American edition.
More ads for teens (see also introductory
page for teenage advertising): Are you in the know? (Kotex napkins and Quest napkin powder, 1948, U.S.A.),
Are you in the know? (Kotex
napkins and belts, 1949, U.S.A.)Are you in
the know? (Kotex napkins, 1953, U.S.A.),
Are you in the know? (Kotex
napkins and belts, 1964, U.S.A.), Freedom
(1990, Germany), Kotex (1992, U.S.A.), Pursettes (1974, U.S.A.), Pursettes (1974, U.S.A.), Saba (1975, Denmark)
See early tampons and a list of tampon on this site - at least the ones I've cataloged.
 
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Sanitary Panty-Kini, menstrual underpants, by Modess, 1960s-1970s
Once upon a time women escaped wearing menstrual napkin belts (here) with pads by putting on specially made panties to
hold the often thick pad in place. You see one method below on a plastic
mannequin that used to hang in the physical Museum of Menstruation (see
more here): two elastic bands in the crotch
gripped the pad. The maker, Modess (Personal Products Company), also made
menstrual pads, belts and booklets explaining
menstruation to girls.
The box containing the panty calls it a "neat little nothing of
a panty" but not so nothing that it doesn't do a job women have struggled
with for millennia.
A doctor's wife in her 60s visiting the museum sat next to this mannequin
for an hour and could not bring herself to more than glance at it. She told
me that she had to wear such things when younger and felt mortified sitting
there. She had brought her niece who was gleefully videotaping the museum
for a college project.
The donor wants to remain anonymous.
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The Modess pad in the panty, typical in its fatness, creates
a bulge that women wanted to conceal, often by
wearing not pants but a dress. Horrors! if a male should discover she was
menstruating.
Harry Finley took all the photos.
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The crotch of the panty shows two bands
holding a genuine Modess tabbed napkin. The long central depression results
from a woman's (or plastic mannequin's) thighs squashing the pad, which
increases rubbing and discomfort, something women have complained about
at least since the 1920s and probably forever. (Read a medical
report about this.) Modess did not indent the pad to accommodate this
but today's larger pads often do.
© 2006 Harry Finley. It is illegal to reproduce or distribute any
of the work on this Web site in any manner or medium without written permission
of the author. Please report suspected violations to hfinley@mum.org
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