All images by Arthur Schatz
…
Thank you to LIFE archive.
High School Fashions, 1969
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Did teenagers value more their smiles in the late 60′s than now? Or did they trivialize less the action of being photographed?
I was there! My absolutely favorite time for fashion. It was never more fun than the late 60′s.
I think everybody was smiling because they knew this was a Life magazine photo shoot. That said, everybody’s looking good. Like they could step into 2011 and not miss a beat.
Like outta sight.
What a time that was! Nothing was off-limits. Sleeves could be puffy, pants could flare out at the bottom. Arizona could be EAST of Texas…
I think most of the students probably knew Life Magazine was coming so they put on their best clothes. Some of those girls look like they were trying too hard to be hippies.
I wonder who’s decision was it to print the photo with the teacher in front of the map backward.
All the GirlFolk. Most of the Boys were wearing Green in ’69….
I have to say that in my high school we really did dress like this and I am no California girl. I am from Detroit. one of the things I noticed in these photo’s is that the girls clearly didn’t have the pressure to bleach their hair blonde. We were free to be natural and be ourselves! By the way I wore one of those midriff shirts in high school.
Cute girls! But yeah, surprising how happy they all seem. Imagine high school kids really smiling that much nowadays.
I was a junior at Kansas State University. These must be girls (in this photo shoot) that were dressed by whatever company took the pictures, because at Kansas State Univ. in 1969, I was a junior, all I saw was baggy old jeans, big flannel shirts and no bras on girls. Maybe the sorority set wore this looks, but they didn’t seem to be around the big campus much plus their housing was a good distance away. It was a very confusing time for me personally with encounter groups all the rage and protests of all kind. No memories that these models appear to have.
@Joanne, the article says “high school fashion” not college fashion. I imagine there was still a bit of naïveté on high school campuses.
Thry look like mock-ups from a vintage catalog.
@Tut – the whole photo is backwards…
The black teacher is gorgeous… =o) Quite a few fine fillies right there…
I love these photos! It’s funny that a lot of these styles right down to the prints are all revived in fashion at the moment, I would wear any of those outfits happily. It seems along with the best music the 60′s claim the best fashion
– I Missed out!
These are not posed shots. The entire issue of “Life” (with poorer scans of these photos) is available
… here on Google Books (gee, thought I could use HTML tags here):
http://books.google.com/books?id=CVEEAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PA40#v=onepage&q&f=true
In 1969, our SoCal high school was featured in at least two print and one television report because the student body fought the ‘dress code’ and won. (My mother still refused to let me grow my hair.) We did dress outrageously when the cameras were expected, but the rest of the time we dressed much less so. Still, puffy sleeves and bell bottoms, fringe vests and moccasins, beads and headbands were daily wear for some. We were having fun. Great to see these photos.
I was in high school then. Graduated in 1972. Man, I remember hot pants, mini skirts and stockings!
I love the red (corduroy?)bell bottoms in the second photo! I definitely would wear those!
College graduate students live in a dorm around the corner from me, and all these fashions, plus long hair, are Back! Plus the weird patterns in hosiery. Good news is that the war in Vietnam isn’t part of the picture.
Very cool
Food for thought: everyone in these pictures are recently eligible for social security
I’m struck by how their bodies aren’t super toned; they don’t look like they’ve spent hours at the gym. It’s nice, actually.
I was in high school at the time,and the girls wore short skirts,shoes with buckles and nylons.Pink lipstick and blond hair were also popular.The guys also had great clothes,striped pants,flowered shirts,and half boots.
The most hippies i ever seen in one website
All of these pictures except the first one look like my high school about that time. In 1969 my hair was longer than my dresses.
These are mostly models posing for Life magazine, not what girls really wore then. Actually they wore short dresses and (always with nylons) and low heeled shoes or bell bottomed jeans and tops.And no bras
and long hair!-
Whad’ya know–no muffin tops! American girls were very cute (with normal body proportions) before the introduction of high-fructose corn syrup.
Definitely models- the hot asian girl is in two photos wearing two different outfits.
these photos are totally the bee’s knees.
Um, does anyone else see Lindsay Lohan?
I wore those clothes- I made most of my own, even the really big bell bottom jeans, which I embroidered. and the jean jacket. My hair was long and straight and I hated wearing shoes- so that worked out. We did smile a lot. We did not have corn syrup in all of our food to make us fat. We didn’t have a lot of possessions to get angry that we didn’t have. We talked to people, but not back at people. Even though high school was still the same weird hormonal time, You look at these photos now, and we all look great, but we still felt just as out of place as teens do now.
Ditto everything Karen said. It was a great, great time to be alive in America. Corn syrup, though, is only one thing making us fat today. Here’s the other two things:
1. Round the clock television – back in this era, I remember television stations stopped broadcasting at 11pm to resume the next day at 6am or 7am. Less television + no computers = more real life interaction + outdoors. Less fat.
and
2. Better relationships with men. Back then, men were less fat, too, and less misogynist. I think a lot of American women today put on weight unconsciously as a tacit declaration of anger towards and mutiny from being in a relationship. Fat will free you from male sexual pressure. And with a lot of us women strengthening our minds, and seeing how good life can sometimes be without fellas, you do the math. I’m not fat, but sometimes I wish I were, because at times the pressure of men’s eyes and comeons makes me wish I were in another country, or not female.
lol…Oh please, listen to you! You really think you’re God’s gift to Men or something?….lol….Shit, why don’t you show pics of yourself to prove your looks? Put up or shut up…
Firstly, for point one, why not just sum it up with two words: “Sedentary Lifestyle”. Either way, I agree with you on that.
And unknowingly, you actually solved a problem you posited in your 2nd paragraph there about what’s really going on today. But you also totally lost any and all credit and respect for me on your little ANTI-MALE BS there….
—”Guys were less misogynist…”—
Firstly, you talk like a 20 something, yet you claim to have lived in this time??…lol. That’s very interesting considering you don’t talk at all like a baby boomer but a babyish ***SELFISH*** immature Generation Y BRAT! And if there’s any truth in what you said on point 2, it’s BECAUSE of FEMINISM! That’s an inconvenient truth though for 99.999% of women. The feminist cause didn’t do SHIT for humanity or women. That’s a fact.
Like 1 or 2 posters mentioned previously, most likely, these were probably paid actors hired on for a Life photo shoot or something. Maybe to make High School kids seem happy, bright and cheery…Remember, the Vietnam war was going on so they probably wanted to make it like American kids were happy as clams. The propaganda machine at work.
—”I’m not fat, but sometimes I wish I were, because at times the pressure of men’s eyes and comeons makes me wish I were in another country, or not female.”—
Whoever you are, it sounds like your just plain messed up in the head. By all means -if you really “look good” and “sometimes wish you didn’t”- then please go on an all HFCS diet and get fat. Humanity doesn’t need idiots like you with your warped and misguided thinking. With your attitude and cynicism you just displayed for everyone here, it’s no wonder why misogyny would be heightened.
Thanks for proving her point
Looks like you got under someone’s thin skin, Heather. Good job!
Less misogynist? Really??
This was a time when women still had far fewer rights than did men, it was not assumed they would be prepared for careers as part of their educations, the overwhelming majority of rapes went unreported, any woman who had a kid out of wedlock was considered an extreme rebel or whore, and everywhere one looked in everyday life there were more “hey there, little lady” condescensions, contraception was not easily available, pap smears and mammograms were not ordinary events, and abortion was largely illegal and so usually performed with a coathanger or screwdriver behind someone’s garage. Girls who got pregnant out of wedlock were commonly ejected from their families or sent to homes for wayward girls, and it was assumed their lives were ruined.
Make no mistake: These years largely sucked for women, and men were far MORE likely to be misogynistic. I will give you that those times likely worked out better for the minority of women who both married well and didn’t have it in mind to make a mark in the world outside of raising their children and keeping house.
If you’re interested talk to more women who actually lived through those times. If you’d like to dwell in cocked-up golden memories of a time you never knew, you’re average.
And as far as the fat comments are concerned, I think it points up a rather serious personal problem if you are anxious to do something to destroy your health to escape the attention of men. Most women don’t seem to think that way. Convenient that you get to blame your personal negative feelings on a whole other gender, as well as the destruction of your own health and self-esteem. Just why you are letting men have that much power over you begs the question as to who really hates whom.
I’m curious about how many of them knew there would be photographers on school grounds that day.
PEACE!
The more typical clothing is in a few pictures, 2, 5, 7, 8, 11, 13, 14. Lots of this looks like models or first day of school one outfit fancy stuff one would not normally wear daily unless you had a lot of money. Bare midriffs were not allowed where I went to school and we had a very relaxed dress code. Note the hair styles of boys ( not really long) and the general lack of makeup on girls. Jeans and T’s were most common, or button shirts on boys. The skirts and dresses were short, or very long- not between usually. Some schools still forbade pants on girls- in 1969 the dress code at my school was changed to allow that.
@Jack hermiz- These are just school kids- not hippies.
Late 60′s was always cool, because even though we had the homework, the duties at home, and the rules. We at least had respect for our elders! Something lost todate!
Omg! These are awesome!!
Hey it may have been big and floppy but did any of you see one of the girls with her butt cheeks exposed for the world to see??? I remember the jean shorts and floppy hats and striped pants….oh and just a reminder the wedge shoes have made a huge comeback!!!
Yes the world was post war and protesting just about everything but my mother never had to worry about me being stabbed or shot at a bus stop!
My children love the music that I grew up with and have all the great albums that I passed on to them ….
We worked hard for our money….I am proud to have been a part of a generation that has made an incredible impact on the world!
People are smiling because that’s what people are supposed to do when someone points a camera at them.
Aloofness and being unconcerned with one’s image – or, worse yet, wishing to present one’s self as melancholy and bored with life – didn’t become acceptable until the mid 1980s.
@Holly, I don’t see any butt cheeks?
I really wish people at my high school would dress like this. Not many teens care anymore.I try to dress with clothes that are not at a mall an such. i try
Usually in fashion what goes around comes around. Why hasn’t fringe ever stage a comeback?
This shoot looks staged. Some of the women look much older than the band geek boys and girls. Methinks they were probably models paraded onto campus in haute couture and the kids ate it up. I’d love to hear someone who was there’s perspective.
I graduated in 1969, NJ, working class HS. In late 1968 our student society overthrew the dress code to win girls the right to wear pants, and boys the right to wear jeans, which were the major points of contention at that time. Mini skirts had been in since around 66 or 67, and they were always worn with tights or pantyhose. In fact, pantyhose were new at that time, invented for use with minis because garter belts and stockings didn’t work. I think the skirt shown here on the teacher is shorter than would have been approved of for teachers, who still had to conform to standards. I agree with Puma who called out photos 2, 4, 7 etc, as looking more like what I remember. Most of the fashions in other photos look more expensive then what kids in my HS could’ve afforded, and overall, these kids are all very attractive, not an acne case or geek in the bunch, and that’s just not realistic. So, I think some of the photos are staged, or probably the photographers and editors selected for the best looking kids. The pretty girls around the school band are probably the cheerleaders. And most of these shots were probably taken at upper middle class schools. The politics of the time were very well described by Booya.
Catch the cars in the parking lot scene; sure an MGA would’ve just been a poorly-reputed used car then and even a woody Town & Country convertible that had survived to ’69 might just then have been starting to be seen as collectible – but then we get a glimpse of what would’ve been a new or almost-new Lincoln Mark III. So this school DID have its’ rich kids, then!
Did anyone else read the article and find the phrase “Many principles now just relax and *enjoy the scene*” (emphasis mine) a bit creepy? Loss of innocence indeed…