Who Wore Short Shorts? : Putting Historical Events into Context
“Clothes
make the man,” usually attributed to Mark Twain[1]
is a phrase clothing stores sometimes use to influence buyers to choose their
clothing lines. Clothes make the first
impression. While working I usually wear
a library themed tie and lab coat while the students and faculty wear a large
variety of clothing types. Some in the
health fields are required to wear uniforms based on their program. Some even
wear shells under the uniform to make them more modest. Others wear more ordinary casual clothing.
Some wear clothes that expose a lot of skin; some wear pants that have ready
made holes or tears. I wondered can
someone be arrested for wearing the wrong clothes in the wrong place?
I
came across the following articles in my family records. They mention the arrest of my father’s older
brother, Louis for wearing short shorts. Getting arrested for short shorts didn’t
make sense. With my Talmud head, I had a lot of questions concerning what was
going on. Isolated events are hard to understand in history. One needs to know if the events create a
pattern or have some context. in order to better understand and interpret the
events.
July 8, 1940 St.
Louis Star and Times
..
Another version
of the story from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch , July 8, 1940
Before
seeing this article, I never heard of the news paper St. Louis Star and
Times. The St. Louis Star-Times was a newspaper published in St.
Louis founded as The St. Louis Sunday Sayings in 1884. The newspaper
ended publication in 1951 when it was purchased by the St. Louis Post Dispatch.
That explains why I never read or even heard of this paper growing up.
I
remember my uncle loved to play handball in the outdoor courts at Forest Park. Afterwards
he would go to the fieldhouse to shower and change clothes. I never saw him play. The outdoor handball courts still exist. They are not within walking distance of the
residences of my uncle and his friend lived at the time. Today it would be a
17-20 minute drive and a 32 minutes trip by public transportation. It probably took longer in 1940. There are no
residences where one can see the handball courts. Outside of painting and
repairs the courts are pretty much the same as in 1940. It is perfectly logical that he would have
been playing handball.
Louis
and Mayer were dressed for handball. In
the above picture two players are without shirts. Since this says nothing about how players
dressed in the 1940’s, I looked in newspapers of the 1940’s and routinely saw
pictures of people in swim suits. The
page in the Post-Dispatch had news of entertainment in St. Louis and ads
for the movies currently showing. Bob Hope was appearing live at the Fox
Theater (in those days the Fox had a stage show and a movie) while down the
street at the Missouri Theater was showing his film, Ghost Breakers. There were no
similar articles about people being arrested even for similar “crimes.” Much
of the news was concerned with the war in Europe. The newspapers provided no
context.
Just
the fact men were shirtless and wearing short pants would not be a reason for
their arrest. Since there are no
residences nearby and no cell phone existed, I wonder who could have phoned a
complaint. There may have book some outdoor phone booths. I told this to one of my fellow librarians and
she suggested that this was racist. I
answered, my uncle and his friend were not African-American or black.
I thought perhaps this was anti-Semitic since they were both Jewish. They
were not wearing kipot or other head coverings.
I could find no evidence of
anti-Semitism or even if it was possible to know they were Jewish from their
clothes or actions. Perhaps someone
thought they were gay? Again, this is
not possible to determine because there were no similar articles. Perhaps this event made the newspapers
because it was so unusual?
Next, I
investigated the law. What were they
accused of violating? The article say they were accused of “indecent conduct.” A search of the St. Louis city code
for “indecent conduct.” The closest I
found was in the code of 1936. [2]
There
was a case in 1986 United States Court of Appeals, Eighth CircuitJul 9, 1986
795
F.2d 652 (8th Cir. 1986) that showed an arrest for “indecent conduct.” Accusing
the appellants of indecent and lewd conduct.
In the case Postscript
Enterprises, Inc. v. Whaley, 658 F.2d 1249 (8th Cir. 1981) it is stated that due
process requires that laws provide fair notice of what is prohibited, as well
as standards of enforcement. Said that due process requires laws that provide
fair notice of what is prohibited. Vague
laws may often trap the innocent by not providing fair warning. While these
cases happened more than 40 years after my uncle’s arrest the concept of vague
laws make it hard to understand what is allowed and what is not allowed. The Municipal Code that was operating in 1940
said that touching of the genital area in public and other behaviors (I’m not
listing the whole law) meant to be sexually provocative are considered lewd.
There is no listing or description of clothing that is too short or skimpy.
The
only mention of “indecent conduct”
refers to threatening or profane language and games that for disturb the feelings
and enjoyment of visitors attending parks.
Since handball was played in open outdoor courts, no one can complain
that playing handball or relaxing after the game could be violation of this
ordinance.
The current
code 14.01.170 - Lewd and indecent conduct[3] has
a section defining exactly what is considered “indecent conduct.” In brief the exposure and/or touching of the
body for the purpose of sexual arousal is forbidden. Movies and theater
productions are exempt from this prohibition.
To summarize
-- 1) There is no context for this arrest. There were no similar stories of arrests in
the newspapers. There was no comment from a complainer. 2) The arrest was not motivated by race or
religion. 3) There is no real ordinance that they broke. What is in the law is vague. There was no notice concerning acceptable
attire. The real story behind the arrest is not known based on the online and
library research that I was able to complete.
There is no way to prove the motivation
of the arrest. All the speculation of
the motivations had no evidence.
Unfortunately, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. My Uncle
Louis died in 1979 and all of my father’s sibling are gone, too. There is no one who had direct knowledge
alive. For now, this will remain unsolved.
============
Appendix
Since I didn’t
find the answers I sought, the story of the search may be of interest as it
becomes more important than the answers.
As a librarian sometimes all we want is the latest and greatest,
forgetting that historical research may require books that haven’t been opened in
many years. While online sources are
great, they a complement not replace in person searches. Sometimes actually
seeing the books is better for finding what you want and not expect than an
on-line search. For example, yesterday I visited an online picture collection that
could be only searched with words such as author, title and keyword, but not browsed
in any way. If a searcher didn’t know
the exact word, there was no way just to look.
This article, while
not “peer-reviewed” by the strict interpretation, was reviewed by several libararians, a
professor, and a friend who is a journalist. From one of the readers, “You may not have
solved the mystery of your father’s older brother’s arrest but the research you
did was fantastic, very impressive. Thanks for sharing. Interesting &
Informative!”
The current
code for the city is online with a link from the City of St. Louis website (https://www.stlouis-mo.gov/government/departments/aldermen/city-laws/code.cfm).
The historical code is harder to find.
I was able to find some of the St. Louis City Revised Code online. The
search was not easy. I used WorldCat and
Books.Google to find the references. The
latest code prior to 1940 was published in 1936. Google books would not provide a full copy
claiming, “copyright restrictions.” This is wrong because the text of
government documents is not protected by copyrights. No library in the Chicago
area had the paper copies. I checked
WorldCat and found copies in St. Louis.
The Washington University Law Library’s copy was marked missing in the
catalog. The St. Louis County Law
Library was near where I was staying. I
tried to find their catalog online and couldn’t. I decided to take a chance and go there. I mentioned to the refence librarian that I
couldn’t find their catalog online. They
said that they don’t have any catalog; not on cards or online. This was the first institutional library that
I ever heard of that didn’t have a catalog. After telling the librarian what I
wanted she looked around. She found the
book in the small rare book room, which was also their break room. I found the
page and took a picture. Most of the library users want the current laws. The library does not get many people doing
historical research.
The newspapers
are partly available online. I visited
the St. Louis County Library main branch to read some of the newspaper microfilms.
The library subscribes to historical newspapers via ProQuest. I found the Post-Dispatch was in their
subscription, but the Star-Times was only available with a paid
subscription. There were no articles in other newspapers of the time.
I found many
municipal ordinances that are vague and difficult to understand what exactly is
forbidden. They had a law against making
disturbing noise or rude or indecent behavior within a place of worship. (in
the 1916 code section 650, page 983; in the current code 15.46.020).
Sept 8,
2019 Addition
One of
the great things about publishing an article to a blog is the ability for
sharing. Connie Williams found some more
articles on the story of short shorts. Bare chested men were not acceptable,
however, the newspaper articles due not say anything about the lack of shirts. The men arrested were brought to court and
fined $5 for sunbathing. From the
articles is seems that Park Commissioner could decide who was dressed properly and
he targeted them as an example. While handball was a sport dominated by Jewish
men in that period, I still have no proof that the arrest for an anti-Semitic
act. A display of power is the best
explanation for how the police knew about them and the newspapers got the
story. I wonder why the newspapers reported that they did not testify in court.
[1] The full
quote, “Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on
society” first appeared in print in 1927, Mark Twain was probably basing his
statement on a line Shakespeare’s character, Polonius says in in Hamlet, “The apparel oft proclaims the man.” Shakespeare probably got the idea from the
Latin writer Erasmus. For a full
examination of the quote see: “What is Origin of “Clothes Make the Man”? by
Alexander Atkins (https://atkinsbookshelf.wordpress.com/2012/03/26/clothes-make-the-man/) and Quote
Investigator (https://quoteinvestigator.com/2012/05/04/twain-clothes/ )
[2] The 1936
edition was found in the St. Louis County Law Library. It is not available online. The Revised Code of St. Louis 1914 is the
same. It is available online via the
Hathi Trust. https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=umn.31951002583030q&view=1up&seq=9
[3] Ordinance
Number 68536, § 2, 12-15-2009.
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