See a Kotex ad advertising this booklet.
Read a Personal Products booklet for older girls from about this time, The Periodic Cycle (1938). See similar booklets on this site.
See also How shall I tell my daughter? and Personal Digest and read the whole booklet As One Girl to Another (Kotex, 1940).
See a Kotex ad advertising a Marjorie May booklet.
See many more similar booklets.
See ads for menarche-education booklets: Marjorie May's Twelfth Birthday (Kotex, 1932), Tampax tampons (1970, with Susan Dey), Personal Products (1955, with Carol Lynley), and German o.b. tampons (lower ad, 1981)
See also the booklets How shall I tell my daughter? (Modess, various dates), and Growing up and liking it (Modess, various dates)
And read Lynn Peril's series about these and similar booklets!
Read the full text of the 1935 Canadian edition of Marjorie May's Twelfth Birthday, probably identical to the American edition.
Is this the first Tampax tampon? Go to Early Commercial Tampons
Other early commercial tampons - Main Tampax patent - Ad from 1936 - World War II Tampax sign
More ads for teens (see also introductory page for teenage advertising): Are you in the know? (Kotex napkins and Quest napkin powder, 1948, U.S.A.), Are you in the know? (Kotex napkins and belts, 1949, U.S.A.)Are you in the know? (Kotex napkins, 1953, U.S.A.), Are you in the know? (Kotex napkins and belts, 1964, U.S.A.), Freedom (1990, Germany), Kotex (1992, U.S.A.), Pursettes (1974, U.S.A.), Pursettes (1974, U.S.A.), Saba (1975, Denmark)
See early tampons and a list of tampon on this site - at least the ones I've cataloged.
CONTRIBUTE to Humor, Words and expressions about menstruation and Would you stop menstruating if you could?
Some MUM site links:
homepage | MUM 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.

"You're a young lady now" (Kotex puberty & menstruation booklet,
U.S.A., 1959)
Complete booklet

This booklet for menarcheal girls, which experienced at least 3 editions (see the 1952 and 1961 versions), continued the unstuffy language possibly begun by the Kotex booklet As One Girl to Another, (1940), a great departure from Kotex's Marjorie May's Twelfth Birthday booklets of the 1920s-1930s. About this time, Kotex went overboard, but pleasingly so, immersing its ads in slang in the "Are You in the Know?" series. Read more about these booklets; here are the ones on this site.

This version is longer than the 1952 one and the drawings and layout are different. Parts of the text are different. It's almost identical to the 1961 edition.

Even though prepubescent girls wore dresses, here a dress represented puberty. But older girls also wore pants at the time. Did she wear a dress for the boys? Compare the two covers, below.

(See a Modess booklet from the same year.)

Look at the upper left corner of the back page; someone cut it. Could the owner's name have been there? That's the exact spot the owner of the earlier edition wrote her name (see below). I wonder if teachers told students to write their names in the same place - 7 years apart! Maybe learning that spot is required for teacher certification.

Below: The covers of the booklet reproduced in the next several pages.
Left: The top of the back cover of the previous edition (1952) shows how the name of the owner (I think) fits in the same spot as the missing chunk in the edition below, where probably its (shy?) owner put her name.
 Each page measures 5 x 6.75" (12.6 x 17 cm).
 
Below: The covers of the 1952 edition, maybe by the same artist, and 1961 version. Again, it shows pants on the prepubescent girl and a dress on the menarcheal one. The 1961 cover dispenses with showing change but continues the feminine-appearance theme.
1952
1961
 
 

NEXT | Introduction (p. 1) - pages 2-3 - pages 4-5 - pages 6-7 - pages 8-9 - pages 10-11 - pages 12-13 - pages 14-15 - page 16 & inside back cover - Read the whole booklet As One Girl to Another (Kotex, 1940), How shall I tell my daughter? and Personal Digest. See similar booklets on this site.

© 2007 Harry Finley. It is illegal to reproduce or distribute any of the work on this Web site in any manner or medium without written permission of the author. Please report suspected violations to hfinley@mum.org