Case #32: The many brands of John Doyle Bishop
When I was writing my thesis proposal, one of the key pieces of information my advisor was interested in was what brands JDB sold in his shop. Since I haven't found any business records, I mainly rely on what I can find out from actual garments. Between MOHAI and items I've seen listed on ebay, I now have a running list of names that are confirmed and those that are likely. I can confirm a name when I find something that has both the maker's label and John Doyle Bishop's. Like this:
But there were many cases (particularly with items at MOHAI) where the garment only had one label, and the donor provided the other information. That is strong evidence but not proof, since donors can be forgetful or might be repeating incorrect information from someone else (proof positive- the donor who believed they had a bloody scarf from the Lincoln assassination).
As my list of confirmed and likely brands grows, I've been doing research about each one so that I can better understand the kind of business JDB was buying from. Before I started this project, names like Pauline Trigere, Ben Zuckerman, Ben Reig, and Maurice Rentner meant almost nothing to me. But I have since discovered that they were all very successful and respected luxury ready-to-wear brands in their day. I also learned that Pauline Trigere stayed young by standing on her head every morning and dating men in their 20s. But those tidbits might not make it into my paper.
Case #47: The mark on the teacup
For our decorative arts class we were each assigned an object from FIT's study collection. I picked this pink teacup:
Which has this mark on the bottom:
As we learned our first day of class, there are apparently huge reference books full of makers marks that you can page through when you need to identify something. I pulled a few for porcelain and was surprised when I came across the answer relatively quickly. Because the mark was hand-done it can look slightly different each time, but this is certainly the mark of porcelain from Derby.
Case #36: George Taylor, where were you in 1926?
I've gotten started on my research of the "hemline index" and have already run into a major mystery. If you google "hemline index" many of the articles (mostly fluff pieces in newspapers) mention an economist named George Taylor and say that he first presented the idea in 1926. The problem is that I can't find any information about what he actually said. No articles cite the original source, and I suspect that they are all just getting their information from each other. There is some information on the web about the George Taylor in question, but he didn't really rise to prominence until later- in fact, in 1926 he was still in school for his Phd. I've tried to find books of his writings, but a library search for "George Taylor" brings up thousands of unrelated hits. This mystery remains elusive and unsolved.
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