Marjorie May, three
booklets, 1935 main
page
See a Kotex ad
advertising this booklet.
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As
one Girl to Another ("one" is not
capitalized in the booklet's title)
1943, "new edition"
Puberty & menstruation booklet from
International Cellucotton Products Co.
(Kotex), 1943, U.S.A.
Discussion.
See the similar 1940
edition, maybe the first
of this booklet. Because
its calendar shows the last
half of 1940 through all of
1941 and this one covers 1944
to the first half of 1945
there must have been
some in between.
A famous
Kotex booklet before
this one.
See an
ad offering this
free booklet. And see a tin of
Quest powder (and
an ad for it). Kotex, on page
10, recommended sprinkling the
powder on pads to stop the
odor. (Read what
causes the odor of
menstruation.) The booklet
mentions Fibs tampon, the Kotex
tampon, developed in the
1930s, on page 16. Fibs had no
applicator, unlike its main
competitor, the two-tube
Tampax (read and see the first
Tampax?).
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Below:
Back of the
introductory page.
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Below
P. 1. Pigtails shout
"Young girl!" So do
lollipops and skates.
At least in the
faraway 40s.
It's an interesting
device to replace the
lollipop with
lipstick, significant
in white Anglo-Saxon
Protestant culture -
WASP culture.
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Below:
See a list
of words meaning
menstruation
and everything
associated with it
in many countries and
languages.
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Below:
Before
the Web, people
actually opened
certain kinds of "books"
to see what a word
meant and to check out
its history. Companies
grouped "pages"
made of paper with
letters and pictures "printed"
on them and made them
all stay together -
they formed a "book"!
A piece of paper made
a "page."
"Webster"
means the girl is
looking in the book of
word meanings
originally created by
Daniel Webster in the
19th century but
updated and changed
many times since then.
But here it might
refer humorously to any
"dictionary"
- the Kotex jokesters
liked snappy writing
and pictures. It
was a "dictionary"
the page below calls "big,
fat." Questions?
At the bottom
the writer refers to
the often cumbersome
and for most women
probably unpleasant
job of washing
the rags most
used used for
absorbing menstrual
discharge - although Kotex did not invent the
disposable pad.
Many
probably bled
into their clothing.
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Next page
Go to covers
& preface | pages
1-3 ("lollipops to
lipsticks,""You're YOURSELF!,"
definition), | 4-7
(duration, cramps, use a calendar
and "don't get caught unprepared")
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8-11 ("warning
signals,"Kotex will never give
your secret away,""daintiness,"
cleanliness, sports) | 12-15
("But don't miss the fun!," "boys
know all about menstruation," do's
and don't's chart) | 16-19
(tampons, use Kotex, cramps
exercises, inside back cover
Kotex calendar 1944-45)
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copyright 2007 Harry Finley
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