Granger 43
- This article is a Biography
- Chapter 43 - The newspapers walks in
That small item in the Peterborough Standard on Friday 7th June 1957, about Ethel having the smallest waist, really set things on the move. It was certainly read or monitored by the National Press looking for sensational news, for on the Saturday morning on 8th June, the Editor of the Sunday Graphic rang us up on the phone to ask us to give him full particulars. "Was it true that my wife possessed a waist at that size, only 14 in, and could it in fact be laced in to 13 inches? How long had she had it? How did she get a waist that small? Did it affect her health and, how did she manage to eat and work like that?" and a lot of other questions. He also asked if we could let him have some photographs.
Well we heard nothing more, so on Monday, I sent him some photographs, but it appears that there was a paragraph about her in the Monday's Daily Sketch, although until someone told me about it I didn't know, because I did not take that paper, but I did get a copy later and it was headed; WIFE, 52, HAS 14 -INCH WAIST: - Mrs Ethel Grainger, aged 52 claims to have the smallest waist in the world - FOURTEEN INCHES. Her statistics are 34 -14 -36. She said at her home in Priory Road Peterborough, "I ride a motor cycle and do a lot of digging in our garden. It helps me keep my figure." The Grangers have been married nearly 30 years and have a 26 year-old daughter.
Then on Thursday, June 11th a photographer from the Advertiser came to take pictures for the Graphic, but as her new corsets had just arrived, we put him off, by saying it was not convenient until the next day, so she should have the chance or trying them on before the photo was taken. They were in fact a most delightful little pair of 'Waist Pinchers' in black shiny satin nylon rather short over the hip bones, but well up under the breasts; had the stiff front steel plate and a back flap under the lacing, with 3 hooks under the busks and with 3 suspenders.
We hurriedly laced them up, and checked that they were in fact 13 inches waist, like the blue ones that had been used for a pattern. We put them on round her waist and with little difficulty got them closed to within 2 inches, to get them settled down. By the next morning I had them laced in to within less than 1 inch of opening at the back, which she said was enough, as she did not want to faint while being photographed. Even so, they had taken off an inch from her waist, for when she put on her pink dress and the black leather studded belt, I could pull it in quite easily a hole further than ever before, and no doubt, given another day, would have got them closed and gained another inch in her belt. She looked magnificent, a beautiful wasp, in high heels and with her ears well decorated all round and a pair of black diamante studded pendants swinging.
However, we had hardly got her fixed up than there was a knock on the front door, and I thought it was the photographer, but it was a young lady who stood there. She introduced herself as Miss Shirley Flack, a reporter from the Woman's Sunday Mirror and she had been sent down to see her, and get some photos. When she saw Ethel her eyes popped out and she really had a shock, for she said, "It really is true. I would never have believed it if I hadn't the evidence here before my eyes, that I can actually feel and touch. We have been running an article on small waists over this T.V. costume show and they could not find anyone smaller than 22 inches and did not believe anyone under 17 inches could exist." In fact it had been stated that the 17 inch waist was a MYTH and never had existed.
She was so excited that she said, "If you will pardon me, I must get on to my Editor about it, for we thought it must be a fake, but now I can tell him that it is really true and also get the photographer down to get some shots of her. We were still expecting the other photographer for the Graphic, but from somewhere locally, I think, she hustled up the photographer and Ethel went down the garden to pose for him. She actually stood on top of one of the beehive lids while he took a number of shots, including one of her numerous belts with a rule beside them. They took one with a tape measure round her waist. She was astonished to see the large garden and the greenhouse, with all the cement work in which she had helped. I must say that Shirley looked as if she could have done with a good foundation garment, but she said, "I don't know how you can do it all like you are, for I am sure it would kill me to try."
Ethel looked really wonderful and the reporter was ecstatic about it, saying, "I don't think they will believe me without the photos, even now." She had noticed her ears and asked about them, saying that they too must be unique, for she had never seen anything like them before. When we told her they were all separately pierced in she was somewhat horrified to think of all the pain and suffering that had entailed. We said there were 17 piercings in each ear. I noticed her looking rather closely at her nose too, and as nose jewels had been in the news, I know she guessed they were pierced too, but she did not dare to ask about them.
We had hardly got her out of the way before the second photographer came, and this time she changed her frock for the one in black nylon, over which her belt came in even closer. As he was only a photographer he was happy just to get her to pose for him in the garden. The next day things really began to happen, probably from the Monday cutting in the Daily Sketch, for she had her first fan mail letter, from a man named Albert Mari, who had heard of her before, but had not been able to establish her identity and where she lived. We had heard of him too it turned out.
He was the man, who had been to Hellman, to have his nipples pierced. He had seen the correspondence in London Life and had visited Mme Verneau and she had talked about Ethel's wonderful waist. Then he had contacted Mrs Stafford, who had mentioned a customer with a 14 in waist. When he visited Hellman again he had told him about the lady with the multiple pierced ears, nose and breast nipples, with that unbelievable waist. It turned out that Hellman had not done his nipples, but he found another doctor to do them for him. Also he had stretched his ears until they could take 1 1/2 inch discs, but when he tried to stretch them further they tore open like Ethel's, but he found a doctor to repair them for him, so I hope to find his name from Albert and see what he can do about Ethel's ear.
On Saturday June 14th the Woman's Sunday Mirror arrived and in it was a beautiful picture of Ethel and a nice article. There were news placards around the town advertising the Woman's Mirror, saying, "Peterborough Woman's Tiny Waist." One of the lady teachers at school had seen the paper, saying that it was a very good picture with a nice write up. I will quote exactly what it does say, as follows:
- It was headed: "IS THIS THE SMALLEST WAIST IN THE WORLD?" by Shirley FlackWOMAN'S SUNDAY MIRROR. JUNE 16 1957. No 121On the right was a full length picture of Ethel, standing in 5 inch heeled black suede strap shoes, on top of the beehive lid; her waist encircled by the black leather brass studded belt, nicely silhouetted against the sky, and showing her pendant earrings. On the left was a picture of her waist, with the tape measure round, showing 14 inches, with the caption, "The tape measure tells the story."
"At 52, Mrs Ethel Granger is 5ft 2ins tall, (in her stockings), bust measure 36 ins. Her hips are 38 ins, but her waist is only 14 ins! And Mrs Granger believes it might become even smaller. This mother of a 27 year-old daughter says, "When I was 23, my waist measured 22 in. Since then it has shrunk, and it seems to be shrinking all the time. I wonder how much smaller it will get? Just before the war it went down to 13 in. I don't know if I want it to be as small as that again. People stare enough as it is." DOUBTRecently W.S.M. published an article on "Can a girl have a 17 inch waist?" Many of the experts quoted in it doubted whether any woman could have such a tiny waist. When I heard Mrs Granger's claim to have a 14 inch waist I could not believe it. But now I have no doubt. The tape measure put around her waist at Mrs Granger's home in Priory Road, Peterborough, Northants read exactly 14 ins.
Every day she has a large breakfast - say, cereal, bacon and eggs, toast and marmalade. Her lunch is usually a three course one and it often includes her favourite dish, steak and kidney pudding. She also has dinner in the evening and supper before bed time. She drinks a lot of tea during the day and often eats home made pastry. SHE NEVER DIETS.
As a hobby she runs a flourishing half acre market garden, doing all the ploughing, weeding, hoeing, pruning and marketing herself. She keeps bees and ducks and breeds cats.BELTSSHE HAS TO MAKE MOST OF HER OWN CLOTHES, BECAUSE SHE CAN NEVER BUY THEM TO FIT. Mrs Granger showed me a collection of leather belts made her husband, William because she could never buy one small enough. Mr Granger, (waist measurement 42 ins) said, "I am sure my wife must have the smallest waist in the country, if not the world. I think it makes her look very dainty. I'm very proud of her. Their daughter, Wilhelmina, (waist measurement 25 ins) said, "Her tiny waist suits my mother. But I wouldn't like it on me."
No sooner had I finished reading it than the Empire News rang up and wanted details. I think that the photo taken for the Graphic was used by them, for on Sunday 16 June the EMPIRE NEWS & SUNDAY CHRONICLE published the picture of her, taken in the thin black nylon dress, 5 inch heeled strap sued shoes, and showing off her earrings and pendants. As before she was wearing the black leather brass studded belt, tightly cinched in round her waist. It was headed :SHE'S 52 AND - OH, WHAT A WONDERFUL WAISTLINE ETHEL HAS!
Empire News Reporter.Mrs ETHEL GRANGER - pictured left - is a 52 year old housewife. AND HAS A FOURTEEN INCH WAIST. "The story of what is confidently claimed as the smallest waist in the world was told to me by her 53 year-old school teacher husband, Mr William Arnold Granger. Why? Because Mrs Granger was far too busy in her nursery garden to stop and talk. Which adds up to the only explanation either of them have for Mrs Granger's phenomenal figure; IT'S BEING SO BUSY THAT KEEPS HER SLIM. "No special diets ­ - she eats as much as I do," said 17 stone Mr Granger. "But she's always finding something to do. Never takes it easy." Mrs Granger even relaxes the hard way - riding HER OWN motor cycle. The Grangers of Priory Road, Peterborough, Northants married 30 years ago. Then, recalls Mr Granger, THAT WAIST was a mere 23 Inches. It was in the years after their daughter Wilhelmina - now 27, with a 24 inch waist - was born that the waist reached its record low - THIRTEEN inches.NO WHISTLESDoes that hour -glass shape cause any clothes snags for Mrs Granger? "No, she makes most of her dresses," said her husband. "But she has to have specially -made corsets of course." Any wolf whistles? "Not while I am around," replied Mr Granger firmly. And the future of THAT WAIST looks quits secure. Mrs Granger has just taken a part -time job with a corset firm."
So that small piece in our local paper got her plenty of publicity.
In the quotation from W.S.M. on 19th June, they mention previous articles about whether a girl could have a 17 inch waist, and I will now quote various items from this Woman's Sunday Mirror of May 12th and give some expert opinions, from which you will see how expert they really were. It was headed, CAN A GIRL HAVE A 17 -INCH WAIST? On the top right is a picture entitled, "PROBLEM. Model girl Pamela Styche has an 18 inch waist." But how tightly must she pull in the tape measure to get down this size and it shows her with a tape measure pulled tightly round her bare mid ribs. In the bottom left is Sabrina, tightly belted, IS SHE UNIQUE? The normal difference between bust and waist measurements is 10 inches. Sabrina's bust is 41 in and her waist is 19 inches.
The article says, "Is there such a thing as a 17 in. waist? How true are the claims of curvaceous beauties who say that their second most vital statistic is so tiny? - How likely is it that an over 40 in bust can curve in to a 17 in 18 in waist? In Victorian and Edwardian times, when the hour glass figure was considered ideal, how common were 17 in waists. Could the steel, whalebone and tough lacing of the corsetry of those days pull a woman's figure in by 4 or 5 inches? Seldom, if at all, is the verdict of the experts - Miss Margery Prior, advisor to the firm of Roussel, the famous corset manufacturers says, "The average waist on a good figure is 20 -23in. Under 20 in, it is considered abnormal, and we seldom come across anybody with this measurement. Girls buy our waspies to pull their waist in, but we recommend that they should never be pulled in to less than 18 in." Famous couturier Hardy Amies says: "The 17 in waist is definitely not a good thing. Quite out of proportion and almost impossible I would say."
Who then, are the girls who have 17 in waists? Jean Bell, who runs one of the leading model agencies in Britain says; "A 17 in waist is quite abnormal - it is really too tiny. I have one little model on my books who is only 5ft 2 in tall. She has a 17in waist, and small though she is, even she looks abnormal. It is difficult to get fashion work for her." Another model girl who has an hour-glass figure - it measures 35-18-35 is Pamela Styche. "I can't even buy a coat or suit to fit," she said. "They all have to be taken in at least 5 inches around the waist." Pamela specialises in full-skirted cotton dresses as worn with 4 or 5 stiffened petticoats to emphasise her tiny waistline. What about the curvaceous girls in show business? Sabrina, famous for her bust measure ­ment of 41 inches claimed that she could pull her waist in to 19 in. But how was this measurement taken? That measurement was taken over a thick knitted sweater, without it, it would be nearer 16 in. British beauty queen Margaret Rowe's vital statistics when she won the title of Miss England in 1955 were 37 -24 -37. Would she like to be slimmer? Margaret says, "My measurements are the same as they were in 1955. I have never wanted to be any slimmer because I consider my measurements are in proportion to my build. I am sure the majority of girls with average or large busts must pull themselves in drastically to be able to boast only 17 in or 18 in waists."
Here are some more views about tiny waists, which show that the experts are not all in agreement. Photographer David Olins: "A 17 in waist would be a distinct disadvantage for a photographic model. It throws the rest of the body out of proportion and looks ridiculous unless the girl is very tiny."
Beauty expert Helena Rubenstein: "A tiny waist in not very smart now but there is nothing wrong with it if the natural organs are not restricted. We would recommend exercises to reduce hips if they were large in proportion."
The British Medical Association: "There is nothing extraordinary about a 17 in waist. It used to be very fashionable. It would not hurt a girl at all, medically speaking, unless she was very heavily built, and laced herself in so tightly that she fainted."
Impresario Bernard Delfont: "I like small waists. But among all the girls I employ I have never met any with a well developed bust and hips and a 17in or 18in waist."
Costume historian James Laver Lever: "The only 17in waist I know belonged to Polaire, the Edwardian actress and it looked ghastly. (N.B. Polaire was extremely ugly and had small hips too, also she wore a ring in her nostril.) Years ago waists were smaller because from a very early age a girl was made to wear a tight corset, which eventually deformed her. Today waists are larger, because women are bigger altogether." Another costume expert, Miss Doris Langley Moore, author of the T.V. series "Men, Women and Clothes". "Thousands of dresses have passed through my hands and I have never seen one with a 17in waist measurement. The smallest I ever saw was a 1909 dress with a 19 1/2 waistline. Most Victorian dresses were 21 round the waist. If you can produce the girl who breathing freely has a 17 in waist, I should like to meet her." (N.B. We challenged her to meet Ethel, but she never replied.)
In the Peterborough Advertiser, April 16th 1957: DESIGNED FOR YOU.
"It's spring, and women will be buying or possibly have bought a new outfit. If they are wise they will also consider a new foundation garment to enhance their figures and to show off the clothes to the best advantage. In Peterborough it is possible to obtain a Barclay foundation garment, guaranteed and designed especially for the individual requirements of the customer. The firm's local representative is Mrs E. M. Granger, of Priory Rd, who has recently taken up this post as a fully trained corsetière. The name of Barclay is well known both in this country and the United States for perfectly fitting and comfortable foundation garments. The firm was founded more than fifty years ago. There were other articles about corsets which came out later I might quote from later."
The following is from Reveille June 17 1951, by Norah Littlejohn:- "The present silhouette is based on the slim, narrow look that outlines the figure. Therefore, the need for a proper foundation garment is more important than ever. Newest designs control with the minimum of boning. They are made in lightweight materials such as nylon, satin and cotton and rely on reinforcement at front, back and sides. They also possess effective strips of elastic that help the body muscles to do the job. Ever since women started to wear clothes there have been shaping garments of one kind or another. It is thought that in the Golden Age it might have been a piece of strong cloth wound round the body to control the form to the fashionable shape at the time.
The first corset is said to have been made originally of metal and later of stiff cloth. It was supposed to be an invention of Catherine de Medici, Queen of France, (who is supposed to have decreed that all her women at court should have waists of 13 inches.) Tight lacing first came into vogue about the 15th century and continued in fashion for two or three centuries up to the time when the Empire style became popular with its no lacing, no waist, high busts and flowing lines.
Fashion took a somersault in the other direction in the reign of Queen Victoria. This was the peroiod for tight lacing when women fainted through having their waistlines pulled in to 17 in. A girl, who today is proud of her 24 in waist just wouldn't have been looked at twice in those days."
The following appeared in the Evening Standard and St James Gazette of Wednesday April 2, 1959, by Jean Brown, under the title, "THE 17 INCH WAIST? IT'S A MYTH!" She obviously HAD not read the pieces in the W.S.M. and Empire News, but her article was answered by another on of Ethel, which I will give in its place of June 18, 1959:
"Did your grandmother have a 17 inch waist? If great-grandmothers are to be believed the female of the species has unaccountably coarsened over the last 50 years. In their day, so the story goes, tiny waists were as common as peas and hardly much larger. ΓÇÿNow when I was a young girl you could have spanned my waist with your two hands.' How many great-grandchildren have been dazzled by reminiscences like these? The explanation seems to be that waists in retrospect, appear smaller just as men were handsomer, summers and manners more perfect. Because the 17 in waist is a myth. Fashion historians who have gone to the trouble of charting waistlines over the centuries say that the average measurement now is just about what it has always been - 24 to 25 inches.
Not even the combined efforts of whaleboned stays and heaving maidservants could have produced a waist the diameter of a small grapefruit. But one can hardly blame them for indulging in a little embroidery on the facts.
In order to achieve the fashionable outline 50 or 60 years ago, women were compelled to undergo agonies of discomfort. There was no soft talk about "Ease of movement" in the corsetry advertisements published in Victorian magazines. A corset advertised in 1877 is "moulded by steam so that the fabric and bones are adapted with accuracy to every curve and undulation of the finest type of figure." Those not born with the finest curves and undulations - then modelled on the hour-glass - looked to their stays to curve them into shape with steely efficiency.
But the claims of corset makers went further than that. There were corsets it was claimed which would give an agreeable and graceful shape to the shoulders, or remove "with perfect ease the fullness of the stomach or bowels." Whether these wild claims were born out in fact is not known. What is certain is that women who habitually crammed themselves into rigid cages of steel and whalebone - the average Victorian corset had at least 16 bones - often suffered more serious internal disturbances. Correspondence columns in women's magazines were full of complaints of redness of the nose and eyes, puffy hands and other symptoms of defective circulation. And times when fashion dictated that the diaphragm should be as tightly laced as the waist, cases of consumption were reported to increase alarmingly.
To anyone accustomed to the leniency of modern girdles, it seems astonishing that women could ever have been induced to take the maxim "One must suffer to be beautiful" so literally. And not only women. Just over a century ago, men were as addicted to tight ­lacing as women. In Beau Brummel's day, when masculine fashions were followed at least as breathlessly as feminine ones, well dressed men adopted corsets to achieve the fashionable wasp-waisted effect. With the accession of Victoria and the cult of the more austere masculine virtues, men's clothes grew more sober, and the corset was dropped along with the other emblems of dandyism. With some relief one imagines.
But the wives and daughters went on submitting to the ruthless constriction imposed by fashion arbiters and corset makers right up to the end of 1914 -18 war. Then came the flapper era, the Charleston, Black Bottom, rushing about in cars and the straight up and down look which temporarily banished feminine curves and corsets with them. Except for the unfortunate who were born voluptuously curved and had to adopt tubular all -in ones to flatten their protuberances, women happily forgot about whalebones and steel bands. But waists and curves are never long out of fashion, and the return of the waist is inevitably followed by the return of the corset.
Even if all women were born with perfect measurements, there would always be some whose urge to improve on nature would lead them straight to the corset counter. The "New Look," was followed by a rush of "waspies" and all -in -ones designed to whittle figures back into line after years of war -time starchy fond and unemphatic clothes.
But the corset which emerged after the war was a very different thing from the inflexible garment worn by the great-grandmothers. Women today lead rather more active lives than they did 50 years ago and accustomed to thinking of comfort in the same breath as fashion, simply could not endure the sort third-degree treatment that Victorian women meekly underwent. The modern girdle - corset not the word in the trade, evocative of the worst horrors of the last century - is seemingly designed to control without constricting. Modern discoveries like two way stretch elastic, lastex have all but replaced springs and bones. The task of coaxing recalcitrant curves into shape has been elevated into something almost approaching a science. A close inspection of one of the latest girdles reveals the most ingenious interplay of fashion and engineering and strains countered at every point by cunning insertions of elastic, tiny strips of whalebone, curved seams. And the miracle is that, for the first time in history, women can be more beautiful without having to suffer at all."
There was a long article in the Liverpool Daily Post Tuesday June 28th 1960. It is about the Sudely Costume Museum by Christopher Driver. I will only quote one piece. "Miss Howard loves wearing these clothes - her favourite period is the 1840s which I find surprising - but then a man's attitude to women's clothes is different from a woman's. We were united, however over a crimson, boned, French corset, 1884, which said all that Toulouse Lautrec could say about the Moulin Rouge. But nearly all the dresses are English. I asked if a women of more generous proportions than herself would have difficulty in squeezing into them. In reply she said, "It's all a fallacy about 17 inch waists. The smallest we have here is 21 - and I am 25 inches." She then showed me a book for argument's sake in which was a circle whose circumference was 17 inches. It could be contained within three columns in this paper."
Ethel's fame had gone far and wide, in fact to the other side of the earth, for a few weeks after the W.S.M. came out with her picture in it, I was walking round the market, and the person on the fruit stall said, "I found your wife's picture in a paper which had been used for wrapping in a case of Australian apples. I will get it for you, if you will wait. Then I received it, it was a copy of the New South Wales Sunday Telegraph, dated July 7th, and in it was reproduction of the picture and article from the Sunday Mirror of June 16th. I wonder where else it went? I should also say, that The People had an article July 26th, 1964 from Cyril Wilkinson about nipple piercings.
In it he said that he had also had correspondence from a woman in Northamptonshire, who has had her body pierced in 30 different places. (That was Ethel.) The doctors said the idea could be dangerous. I may quote more at a later date.
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