See a prototype of the first Kotex ad.
See more Kotex items: Ad 1928 (Sears and Roebuck catalog) - Marjorie May's Twelfth Birthday (booklet for girls, 1928, Australian edition; there are many links here to Kotex items) - 1920s booklet in Spanish showing disposal method - box from about 1969 - Preparing for Womanhood (1920s, booklet for girls) - "Are you in the know?" ads (Kotex) (1949)(1953)(1964)(booklet, 1956) - See more ads on the Ads for Teenagers main page
Ads for the Kotex stick tampon (U.S.A., 1970s) - a Japanese stick tampon from the 1970s.
Early commercial tampons - Rely tampon - Meds tampon (Modess)
CONTRIBUTE to Humor, Words and expressions about menstruation and Would you stop menstruating if you could?
Some MUM site links:
homepageMUM address & What does MUM mean? | e-mail the museum | privacy on this site | who runs this museum?? |
Amazing women! | the art of menstruation | artists (non-menstrual) | asbestos | belts | bidets | founder bio | Bly, Nellie | MUM board | books: menstruation and menopause (and reviews) | cats | company booklets for girls (mostly) directory | contraception and religion | costumes | menstrual cups | cup usage | dispensers | douches, pain, sprays | essay directory | extraction | facts-of-life booklets for girls | famous women in menstrual hygiene ads | FAQ | founder/director biography | gynecological topics by Dr. Soucasaux | humor | huts | links | masturbation | media coverage of MUM | menarche booklets for girls and parents | miscellaneous | museum future | Norwegian menstruation exhibit | odor | olor | pad directory | patent medicine | poetry directory | products, current | puberty booklets for girls and parents | religion | Religión y menstruación | your remedies for menstrual discomfort | menstrual products safety | science | Seguridad de productos para la menstruación | shame | slapping, menstrual | sponges | synchrony | tampon directory | early tampons | teen ads directory | tour of the former museum (video) | underpants & panties directory | videos, films directory | Words and expressions about menstruation | Would you stop menstruating if you could? | What did women do about menstruation in the past? | washable pads
Leer la versión en español de los siguientes temas: Anticoncepción y religión, Breve reseña - Olor - Religión y menstruación - Seguridad de productos para la menstruación.


A box of Society menstrual napkins (American? 1920s-1930s?)

Were the manufacturers trying to elevate the tone of their embarrassing product by calling it Society? (See San-Nap-Pak pads for another example of this.)

Early Kotex ads always featured middle-class-and-above women, but that's who its clientele was. Maybe that was the case here.

The box bears no patent or trademark information; you see below all the writing that appears inside and out.

Is it American? The graphics look as if they come from the 1920s or 1930s, obviously from an English-speaking country.

The pad itself matches exactly the size of the first Kotex pad, which probably indicates the size necessary for the usual belt. (See some belts from today.)

See the pad.

 

 

Above: Outside end flap. Whoa! It would have been a cruel trick indeed if the pads had not been absorbent!
 
Left: The largest face of the box. It's possible women bought the box already wrapped to conceal what was inside. Several museum visitors, children of druggists or pharmacists, told me that they helped their fathers wrap Kotex and other pad and tampon boxes as kids to spare the customers embarrassment. Some companies shipped their boxes already wrapped in plain paper.
The box measures 9" x 7.5" x 3.38".

Right: Inside end flap. Plumbing always challenged pad and tampon makers. Early Kotex instructions also directed women to flush pads (see a Spanish language booklet), and, later, other companies made "flushable" products. 
 


See the pad.



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