Belt topics
See how women wore a belt (and in a Swedish
ad). See a modern belt
for a washable pad and a page from the 1946-47
Sears catalog showing a great variety - ad for Hickory
belts, 1920s? - Modess belts in Personal Digest
(1966)
See a Modess True or False? ad in The American
Girl magazine, January 1947, and actress Carol Lynley
in "How Shall I Tell My Daughter" booklet ad (1955) - Modess . . . . because ads (many dates).

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The Museum of Menstruation and Women's Health

A museum visitor from the Philippines,
a chemist now living in Los Angeles, scolded your MUM director for having
incorrectly fastened the Kotex menstrual napkin to the belt, at right -
hey, I'm just a guy!
She thoughtfully took a minute to retie
it on the mannequin (not shown; this is an older photo), saying, with an
edge to her voice, we can't let it fall off. She was old enough to have
worn belts and pads for years.
Younger visitors often see what a menstrual belt looks like
for the first time; often, they have just vaguely heard of them.
© 1998 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
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Women have worn variations of menstrual pads and
belts probably for centuries. In America the Kotex sanitary napkin
belt with pad (near left) was common from 1921 (when the brand was
started; see its first ad) to the 1970s (see
a Swedish ad from this time), when self-adhesive
pads for menstruation came on the market. (See many old menstrual belts.)
But women can still buy menstrual pads and belts from smaller manufacturers,
as the far left mannequin shows. This is a washable
menstrual pad from a Canadian manufacturer; inserts add thickness for
added protection to the sanitary napkin.
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