Fifties Halloween Costumes – The Times Weren’t A Changin’ Just Yet
Check out all the fifties inspired costumes here >>> The decade known as the 1950’s is often viewed as a fairly conservative time with not much really changing. The truth is that things are always changing, in fact the only constant is change if that makes sense. Even so, in terms of costumes the fifties seem to be remembered by innocent or kitsch type of costumes. In terms of innocent, you will get the sock hop costumes or the outfits that teenage girls might wear when going on a date or socializing with buddies at the local diner or milk bar. These are some referred to as poodle skirts. They seem very feminine by modern standards with big skirts and lace petticoats to fill them out. The skirts would end just below the knee allowing girls to show off a shapely calf or two. They would wear bobby socks, which were short socks that ended around the ankle. This also allowed them to showcase their shapely legs. The socks also had another purpose, the kids would take off their shoes and dance in their socks to avoid scuffing the surface that they were dancing on. This became known as a sock hop party as in hop ping around or dancing. This was a great craze, and songs were even written about the sock hops.
The greasers were probably inspired by the Marlon Brando film “The Wild One” which deals with a biker gang and the culture around it. Brando made the idea cool and young male teenagers wanted to emulate this role. Much of the teenage life, especially social life, revolved around the diner and milk bar. This is apparent in the much loved TV series “Happy Days” where everything seemed to revolve around the drive in diner known as Arnolds. The cool kid in this series was also a Greaser and we all know him as Fonzie. These environments would employ waiters and waitresses in kitsch style serving costumes. They would tend to be garish in color and style to attract attention and became known as car hop costumes. |
