I think it's the uniform

[kindkit]

Rotha Lintorn-Orman, driver with the Women's Reserve Ambulance during the First World War and founder in 1923 of the British Fascisti, the first fascist party in the UK. Disturbingly hot.




I found this picture in a really interesting article about Mary Richardson, a militant suffragette in early 20th century and a fascist supporter by the 1930s.

Comments

[vilakins]

Absolutely. She looks so strong and interesting.

Back then it was an era full of possibility for women, many of whom grabbed the opportunity to claim men's clothes and freedom. Odd that WW1 created it but WW2 put women right back again.

[kindkit]

Odd that WW1 created it but WW2 put women right back again

I'm not sure I follow you. Are you talking about the post-WWII years when women were told to get back in the kitchen so that men could have the jobs? As far as I know, the war itself opened up all kinds of spaces for women to do non-domestic work, not just in factories and on farms but in the military itself, which hadn't been the case in the First World War.

[vilakins]

Yes, that. It happened here too, and the 50s were so much worse for woman than the 20s and 30s and lacked the heady hope of the earlier times. OTOH WW1 changed attitudes and even clothing (to much freer styles).