January 19, 2011

Division Avenue High School's dress code did not permit female students to wear slacks even on cold days


By Sandy Adams '60

Something in one of the blog stories by Dewain Lanfear triggered a memory about snowy school days in young Levittown.

There was a dress code at Division Avenue High School, and slacks were not permitted to be worn by female students. Slacks were not in style yet during our early high school years. The slacks that we young ladies owned were mostly ‘dungarees’ – ‘jeans’ were not yet in our vocabulary.

I don’t believe that any of us were bused to DAHS after ninth grade, so many of us had quite a hike in bad weather. On snowy, very cold days, we would wear our slacks underneath our skirts or dresses. We were permitted to enter the building, but we had to use the ladies room immediately to remove the slacks and put them into our locker for the day.

I don’t remember if this dress code changed before our senior year. Perhaps someone else has another recollection of this practice.
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5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wally Linder '61 wrote to Frank: I don't remember the full details, but there was a Bermuda Shorts day, and I think it was my senior year '61. I did not participate, but I can remember people showing up in Bermuda Shorts and being sent home by Jim Riley off the front lawn of Division.

Susan Chasin Ross said...

The "code" that I remember...in 7th Grade, was that we weren't allowed to wear more than one pair of socks. Now picture this....many of us were into the "fad" of wearing several pairs of thos very heavy socks, (hunting style??)...Our sock totals were actually checked in homeroom and then we'd go into the girls' room to put some more of those lovely socks on. What the hell were we thinking?????

SoarLasVegas said...

I remember in 1968 when the dress code actually did change, where girls could wear pants to school in the winter.
Seems so mundane these days, but it was a monumental shift in power of "the code".
It was however, the time of big change in our society.
Took some god people pushing the issue.
Cannot recall who they were.
Thanks in in the absence of the years.
Las Vegas Dave

Sue V said...

As of our graduating year of l962, we were still not allowed to wear pants of any kind to school. I do remember walking the mile , or so it seemed miles, to school in deep snow, with a skirt on. I guess it was not "ladylike" to wear pants????

JoAnn Cali-Rossi 1966 said...

The dress code had not changed in 1966 as well. I remember one day I wore culottes to school. Anyone remember them? They looked like a skirt because they had wide legs. I thought I could get away wearing them, but I was caught. I was sent home during lunch break to change and was told I had to be back for my next class. I lived just under a mile from school on Pleasant Lane. Running was not my thing!!!