A flapper (and Barbara Stanwyck through the decades)

I just came across these photos today and I thought there was something evocative about them, so I wanted to share.
This is a German flapper apparently called Betty Karrenbauer. She appeared on my facebook feed as I have "liked" the website Retronaut. If you're not a fan of Retronaut already, click on over and I'm sure you will be!

It says about Betty:

"This is a “Betty Karrenbauer” who lived in Darmstadt during the second half of the 1920s.

It could be a Barbara Karrenbauer who was born 21st of January in Püttlingen 1906. This Barbara K lived in Darmstadt in the 1920s, at least until 1932, where she worked as a waitress. Only 18 years old she had a baby, named Erika, out of wedlock.

But it could also be a Barbara who was born Karrenbauer, but change her surname to Daum when she got married, and also lived in Darmstadt during the 1920s. She became a widow in 1944 and worked as a business woman.

And that’s all I know, they don’t have any more informatione at the Hessisches Staatsarchiv Darmstadt…" 

A fantastic photo, don't you think?

It struck me that many of the images I've chosen to share on this blog have in some small way challenged gender stereotypes. Like Alice in the post below. Flapper culture very much challenged the chaste and demure image of women that had persisted through Victorian and Edwardian culture. The 20s saw a 'new woman' emerge and her trademark was short cropped hair and a much more androgynous look. I read the biography of Louise Brooks a couple of years ago and I did find it quite fascinating to read about the wild kids of the roaring 20s and what they got up to. She was such a character, Louise Brooks. 

I don't know about you, but when I look at pictures from different eras I tend to imagine the people I see as contained within their specific time bubbles. I have a hard time imagining this Betty in the 40s and 50s, she seems forever captured in the 20s, where I think she belongs. It makes me slightly sad to think of her growing older, changing her fashions, growing her hair and her hemlines... 

I see the 20s and 40s particularly as more liberating for women and the 30s and 50s as almost counter-reactions, when culture swung back in the other direction, drawing women back to hearth and home. It's quite likely that had a lot to do with the wars. I'm not a historian, but I think I might like to read a bit more about social history. If anyone has any book tips, please let me know!

On the topic of imagining the decades as their self-contained little bubbles... I came across this image of Barbara Stanwyck in the flapper era.

She's someone I associate most with the 40s. I've loved her in some films of the 40s (I have the worst memory for film titles!). 

here is pictorial evidence that she definitely didn't stay trapped in the 20s. She had a very long film career that stretched until the 1980s.

Barbara in the 50s

and late 60s

here she is in Dynasty in the 80s

This is a bit of a disjointed post, sorry about that, but that's just how my brain works.... it's always a jumble!