1970s

 What Did We Really Wear in the 1970s?

Were you born before 1970? If so, do you remember the '70s? The music? The hairstyles? The fashions?

I certainly remember the music. The clothing, however, is a bit fuzzier.

Tonight, I'll be attending the Northeast Kansas Arts Foundation's WNEKAF Top 40 – Songs and Sounds of the 1970s program, and attendees have been encouraged to dress in 1970s attire.

That simple request sent me on a trip down memory lane.

When I thought about what I actually wore during the decade, I realized my wardrobe wasn't nearly as dramatic as many people imagine when they think of the 1970s. During my freshman year of college, I mostly wore skirts and dresses to class. As a chemistry major, my sophomore and junior years meant jeans paired with a white lab coat on Tuesdays and Thursdays for chemistry labs. From my senior year of college through the remainder of the decade, skirts, dresses, and slacks made up most of my wardrobe. Looking back, the only thing that might fit today's stereotype of 1970s fashion was the length of my skirts during the early part of the decade!

To refresh my memory, I pulled out some yearbooks.

The first photo isn't of me, but it does show the teaching staff at Nemaha Valley High School in 1977. It's a good reminder that most female teachers looked...well...pretty normal. There aren't many bell-bottoms, platform shoes, or psychedelic prints in sight.

As I looked through the yearbooks, I found only a couple of casual photographs. One was taken during my sophomore year when SPURS sponsored a Walk for Mankind. As one of the SPURS members, I helped register participants, and I'm the person on the right wearing a plaid jacket with my hair pulled back.

The other casual photo comes from my first year teaching at Nemaha Valley High School, where I helped sponsor the pep club.

The remaining photos are my annual school portraits from the 1970s. Looking through them, I was struck by how classic—and ordinary—the clothing really was. Aside from changing hairstyles and a few fashion trends, much of what we wore wouldn't look terribly out of place today.

So, will I be dressing in the exaggerated "1970s costume" that often comes to mind? Probably not. Instead, I'll be wearing something much closer to what I actually wore for an evening out during the decade.

Sometimes the real 1970s were a lot less flashy than we remember!