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Yay, the keynote at the Mid-Atlantic/Southeast Regional CSA conference! Corsets at the Centennial: Showcasing Women Inventors, Dress Reform, and American Industry, from Kristina Haugland. 🗃️🪡

A lot of the corsetiere firms displaying at the Centennial Exposition were either fully or partially headed by women! Prior to the 1870s, the corset industry was even more female-led.

More common was for firms headed by men to be selling and showing corsets designed and patented by women like Madam Foy and Madame Griswold.

Gooooooood morning! We are all on track to start with Alison Bazylinski's paper, "Short Pants Cause Long Controversy: the Fight for Uniform Pants in the Post Office". 🗃️🪡

She works at the National Postal Museum postalmuseum.si.edu so if you're interested in the topic, you know where to find out more!

Next: "Early Baltimore County Elites: Fashion, Taste, and Status in the Household of Captain Charles Ridgely and Rebecca Dorsey Ridgely of Preset-Day Towson, Maryland" by Susan Picinich of Towson U. @towsonu.bsky.social

Comparing a portrait of Rebecca by Hesselius to some of his other work - clearly working on a stereotype, he painted them all in basically the same outfits and identical accessories.

In the third generation, we do have a couple of extant gowns owned by Eliza Ridgely - like this one at Maryland Center for History and Culture.