Sloppy Joes and Bobby Sox

Both Mimi Sheraton and Cynthia Ozick report going everywhere dressed in the uniform of the teenage girl of the '40s: Sloppy Joes, knee-length pleated skirts, bobby sox and saddle shoes. Sheraton tied her shoes with plaid laces adorned with bells (a fad my mother was reprimanded for wearing to high school a few years earlier). It was how almost every young girl on campus dressed. So much for Village non-conformity. Sloppy Joes were very loose sweaters worn several sizes too large with the sleeves rolled up. They were sometimes dressed up for more formal occasions with beads or a pearl necklace. Then in 1947 the New Look descended and suddenly all the young women students were in long skirts that reached to their ankles.