Wild Boys of the Road, 1933

 

  It is remarkable that under the umbrella of pre-code film we find movies that span from escapist musicals, comedies and romances, to gritty harsh realism that looks at the darker side of society and human nature. The film Wild Boys of the Road, from 1933, is one of those darker films - which gives us a glimpse into the harsher realities of the Great Depression. I have watched a number of films like this lately thanks to the excellent series of Columbia Pictures restorations from the 1930's being shown through UCLA Film & Television Archive, and it is remarkable how filmmakers really began to work with realism and darker themes before the Motion Picture Production Code (Hays Code) started putting limits on film content in the name of morality and decency. You can see the beginning of attitudes and stylistic elements that would later become staples of film noir style in some of these pre-code films.

image taken from imdb.com

image taken from Northwest Chicago Film Society

     I really think this is an excellent film. I will not summarize in too much detail because there are already some great summaries available on other websites; I recommend looking at the summaries on these pages: Self-Styled Siren, Twenty Four Frames, and Wonders in the Dark. Instead I wanted to share some great period details from the film that stuck in my mind.

     Just for background, this film is about two high school boys who have to drop out of school to look for work when their fathers loose their jobs because of the Depression, and they find themselves riding the rails with a gang of other displaced young people with nowhere to go. Every place they settle into they are turned out of, and every time they seem to be getting ahead they run into bad luck. Frankie Darro, a child star who got his start in the silent era, plays Eddie, the incredibly likable and charismatic main character who keeps the film from falling too deeply into gloominess and depression with his ability to stay determined and optimistic in the face of adversity, and to put his friends and him family's happiness before his own. At the beginning of the film we see his car, Lena, which seems to be reflective of his spirit and attitude towards life; despite being a rough and falling apart, he makes the most of it, laughs at its shortcomings, and loves it for what it is.

     

     This film is also one of the few where we see women riding the rails, hiding their hair under floppy caps (like the ones Zasu Caps make!), dressed in men's clothing to avoid unwanted attention - which reminds me, of course, of Louise Brooks in Beggars of Life.

Beggars of Life, 1928 - Louise Brooks. Image from britishsilents.co.uk

Dorothy Coonan Wellman plays a young displaced girl riding the rails

Rochelle Hudson inside a boxcar, heading to Chicago

A sketch by me of Dorothy Coonan in her hobo getup

Some ladies in pants near the train tracks from a scrapbook in my collection

     Having inherited my father's love of steam trains, I really enjoyed the scenes showing the train as the children traveled across the Midwest. Family legend has is my great grandparents went from Montana to Nebraska this way during the Great Depression, and that a kindly railroad employee, seeing that my great-grandmother was pregnant, let her ride in the caboose (great-grandpa had to stay on top of the train, however). Here are some great screen-captures of the train:

     Lastly, the film shows the brutal conflict between police and displaced and homeless people in this era; while we are given a bit of a Hollywood ending when the justice system is merciful with our young heroes, scenes like the one below show how local law enforcement was more concerned with passing the problem along to the next city by chasing them out of town than dealing with the annoyance of having a homeless encampment on their doorstep:

Vintage Leather Purse Care

I have had the good fortune to add several beautiful leather purse from the 1920's and 1930's to my collection in the past year or so, and in the process have become aware of the need to properly condition these pieces before using them. With the large increase in vintage leather pieces in my life due to my boyfriend's ever-growing WWI collection, we have been experimenting with a lot of different products to find things that will rehydrate and condition the leather without darkening or changing it too much. As with any organic material, leather dries out over time, and this can make it brittle and weak. We have found that a little bit of saddle soap can do wonders to soften and clean up a vintage piece before you start using it, even if the leather appears pristine to begin with. Most vintage leather pieces you find will not have been conditioned in decades, and if you want to be able to get a lot of use out of it you do not want to forget to take the time to do this first. Here are a few pictures of the purses I just recently used saddle soap on; they look good but the leather was cracking on the navy one, and the light brown one was so dry it that bits were starting to crumble off of it when touched. The Art Deco one with the flowers was in good shape but seemed a bit dry, and I wanted to make sure to do this before I start using it. After the saddle soap dried I used some light brown shoe polish on the light brown purse; I need to get some darker red-brown for the contrasting parts - I will add pictures once I do. While I have learned a lot about this from experience I am by no means an expert, so if you have any other tips or product reccomendations please share them in the comments section.

These pictures are before:

These pictures are during & after:

And this is just to show off the NRA tag inside my favorite purse!

Why Moderne?

          For a long time now I have considered creating a blog but one thing always derailed me - choosing a title. I knew I wanted it to be somewhere I could share images of art, design, and fashion from the eras I loved. I don't want to focus solely on fashion, since there are already so many other excellent vintage fashion blogs out there. I want it to be an exploration, and celebration, of the aesthetics and the spirit of an era that has always fascinated me; the 1920's. I want it to be a place I can talk about my favorite artists and share images of their work in the hopes more people might appreciate them. I also want it to be somewhere I can share my passion for old cars, which is an interest I feel many female vintage enthusiasts shy away from but which can be one of the most exciting and immersive ways to experience the past. For me much of this developed from my passion for silent film and early talkies, but it also comes from growing up in Oakland, California; a city with some of the most awe-inspiring Art Deco architecture in the world. I can not remember exactly where my interest began, but it has been since around 2007 that I have been an active participant in vintage events and a member of the Art Deco Society of California, and I have been a member of their Busby Berkeley style chorus girl dance group the Deco Belles since 2007.
         I once worked with a woman who had an antique shop in the 1960's and she remembers a time when nobody used the term Art Deco - that like many terms we use when discussing art from the past we are using a term that was not used when that art was new; because when a style is new it is often impossible to define it let alone find a name that fits it. Back in the 20's those highly stylized designs were simply called 'moderne', since they belonged to a cutting edge stylistic movement which drew influence from cubism, and which was being developed primarily by the French. The Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs et Industriels Modernes in Paris in 1925 would draw great attention to these new styles and the artists who exemplified them. This style would define the 1920's and early 1930's, before gradually developing into Streamline Moderne in the mid to late 1930's. The beginnings of this style are almost impossible to pin down, when you consider the art movements that inspired it were in full swing well before WWI, but I generally agree that you begin to see it as early as 1910, as defined by the title of the incredible 2004 exhibit Art Deco: 1910-1939 at the Legion of Honor in San Francisco, which I had the great luck of seeing in person. This show was where my interest in Art Deco grew into a full-blown obsession. The focus of my own interest begins around WWI and tapers out at the end of the pre-code era (pre-1934). While I certainly have an interest in, and appreciation for, other eras, it is this era that fascinates me most, and therefore will be the focus of this blog.
       I chose the name Mademoiselle Moderne because it sounded like a name that could have been on a fashionable women's magazine in the 1920's. I also chose it because the concept of the style moderne captures what I love about this era, and the elegant and exciting style that I strive to study in the hopes of being influenced by in my own art, fashion, and design. I hope that I can share that enthusiasm here, along with new images, information, and opinions that others might enjoy or learn from just as I have.

Me at the top of the Los Angeles Bullocks Wilshire building.