Which mother of a famous historical world leader died because of unfortunate footwear?
Which 19th century fashion item was problematically flammable?
Find out all that and more as we reveal some of the deadliest clothing of all time.
The Victorians had a complicated relationship with arsenic. They knew that it was deadly.
Great Britain even passed two different bills that restricted how much arsenic one individual
could obtain. But in a key oversight, that legislation didn't account for industrial use.
So people who made artificial flowers were at risk of ingesting arsenic-laced
powder that was used as pigment for the fake leaves. And in 1861, flower maker
Matilda Scheurer died painfully after ingesting too much over the course of her short career.
As recounted by The Paris Review, it all really started in 1775, when chemist Carl
Wilhelm Scheele mixed sodium carbonate, arsenious oxide, and copper sulfate. The solution produced
a bright green dye, eventually known as "Scheele's green," that proved to be both
irresistible and deadly. Wearers of the dye could gaze in horror upon skin ulcerations,
while also wondering if they were poisoning their fellow partygoers. What's worse, the dye was so
loosely applied that it could easily be shaken out while a wearer was dancing or making small talk.
Shirt and jacket collars may seem pretty innocuous, but for some men in the 19th
century, they were death traps. But it all started as a convenience. The
detachable collar was invented by New York housewife Hannah Lord Montague in 1825.
Sick of laundering her husband's shirts when the collar got dirty, she realized that she could
simply create a separate collar that kept him looking tidy while sparing her extra washing.
Eventually, highly starched collars became all the rage, though they were occasionally referred to as
"father killers." The reason was that if a man were to become unconscious,
perhaps by having one brandy too many, then he might slump forward, and the overly stiff
collar could then cut off his airway and blood supply. This might sound farfetched,
but it reportedly did happen on occasion. In 1888, The New York Times wrote about one man who was
found dead in a city park, having apparently gotten drunk and then passed out on a bench.
When his head fell forward, his fashionable collar cut off his breathing. And a 1900 edition of Daily
Mail and Empire reported that another unfortunate victim was found dead in his bed. The cause of
death was determined to be a collar so tight that it choked him and caused bleeding in his brain.
"You don't mind if I borrow your neck for a moment, do you?"
Silk is expensive. But in the early decades of the 20th century, advancements in chemistry made
it possible for people to enjoy all the luxury of silk without the high price point. But for
the people manufacturing this other fabric, the price of fashion may have been a bit too high.
The fabric in question was viscose, a subtype of rayon,
which is itself a synthetic material that must be made in a factory-type
setting. It was initially hailed as a wonder product, thanks to its many applications.
But workers who produced it were exposed to carbon disulfide. This toxic substance resulted
in significant mental health disturbances, to the point that some workers had to be physically
restrained from jumping out of second-story windows after exposure warped their minds.
Even if someone could detox from the carbon disulfide,
they weren't necessarily in the clear, as even the seemingly lucky
survivors were more likely to develop Parkinson's disease later in life.
Meanwhile, the people who wore viscose or rayon clothing experienced no known side effects at all.
If you've ever worn heels out for a night on the town, then you know that these fashionable
shoes can sometimes present a bit of a gamble. The higher the heel, the more likely you are
to take a nasty tumble. But could it be so dangerous that it could actually kill you?
(Gasps)
That's apparently what happened to a late 19th- and early 20th-century socialite named Jennie
Jerome. In 1874, she married Lord Randolph Churchill, thereby becoming Lady Churchill,
and she would eventually become the mother of future British Prime Minister Winston Churchill.
Jennie lived a rather dramatic life, serving as a nurse during wartime, acting as a writer
and editor, and navigating the intense and sometimes cutthroat world of British high society.
But it all came to an end in June 1921, when at the age of 67 she was rushing down the stairs at
a friend's manor. Her high-heeled shoes caused her to slip and break an ankle. Even worse,
the fracture became infected to the point that her leg had to be amputated. But that still wasn't
enough, as that leg's artery eventually began to hemorrhage, and she died later that month.
Skirt length has seemingly been a neverending topic of discussion over the years.
If you went to a Catholic school, for example,
you're surely scarred by memories of nuns whipping out their rulers.
"Any of the teachers or the nuns would be able to say, 'Get on your knees,'
and if your skirt didn't touch the pop can, you got a detention."
But there was once a time when skirts were considered too long,
and not just because they weren't on-trend.
Instead, the problem was that trailing skirts were bringing death and disease into the home.
During Victorian times, more and more people began to accept the legitimacy of germ theory.
Yet urban sanitation was still catching up to this realization,
so streets across the globe remained a bit of a dangerous petri dish.
Thus, a particularly cringeworthy sight was a woman with a long skirt dragging
through all of that diseased muck and then returning home to her unwitting family.
By 1900, many people believed that deadly diseases like influenza or typhus could be
brought into the home via these skirts. Some women even reportedly resorted to devices
meant to hitch up their skirts while they walked about. To be fair to fashionistas,
it wasn't just ladies who were carrying disease. As detailed by the book Fashion Victims:
The Dangers of Dress Past and Present, garments made in many contexts, from bespoke to ready-made,
could bear disease-carrying bugs if the workshop it came from was contaminated.
Lest you think that the Regency and Victorian era had a lock on deadly fashion trends,
just take a look a little closer to home at the 1990s and early 2000s.
If you were old enough at the time, you may have sported a pair of fashionably sandblasted jeans.
But you probably didn't realize that those jeans that are now tossed away
in a dark corner of a forgotten closet came with a deadly cost.
That's because sandblasting can seriously afflict workers with a disease known as silicosis.
Manual sandblasting requires an air compressor, a hose, and sand,
which means that fine silica dust often floats around workers. Without protective equipment,
which can be in short supply in poorly regulated factories, workers inhale the dust. After a while,
they can suffer irreversible effects like shortness of breath, weakness, and persistent
coughing. Some even become permanently disabled. In the worst cases, silicosis can be fatal.
It's been a documented problem in places like Bangladesh, Turkey,
and China, where Al Jazeera reported on poorly
ventilated workspaces producing jeans for brands like American Eagle and Hollister.
For well-to-do people during the Victorian era, when fashion was extreme and regulations were
erratic or downright nonexistent, mourning wasn't just a time for grief. It was also
a time to be fashionable. Women especially were expected to follow a restrictive set of customs.
At the height of this trend, widows were expected to spend a full year in "deep mourning," as they
wore all-black dresses made out of a dull fabric. And when they dared to venture outside, they
would put on veils covering their faces. After a year, it was socially acceptable for them to
lighten things up a bit in the "second mourning" and "half mourning" stages, which implemented a
bit of color, but of course, not too much, lest they appear to enjoy the loss of their husbands.
Ironically enough, all that black fabric could be deadly. Early synthetic black dyes included
the likes of benzene, arsenic, chromium, and other toxic chemicals. Wearers sometimes suffered skin
irritation and damage to their respiratory system, as well as digestion issues. And as
some doctors argued, wearing too much of this fabric could even potentially lead to death.
Ballet dancers today have to deal with some serious bodily consequences for their art,
from pressures to maintain a certain weight to the toe-crushing forces demanded by pointe shoes.
But you probably won't see a modern ballerina going up in flames anytime soon.
Unfortunately, dance trends of the past meant that this was once a fiery reality,
due to 19th-century trends for gossamer skirts and stages lit by oil lamps and candlelight.
These flowy fabrics encouraged the free circulation of air, and if flames got too close,
this could also mean the rapid growth of fire.
That's what happened to ballet superstar Clara Webster, who died in 1844 after an oil
lamp touched her outfit. Other dancers dressed in similar clothes stayed away for their own safety.
And in 1862, ballerina Emma Livry died of blood poisoning over the course of an agonizing eight
months after her skirts caught fire on stage. She could've worn a costume that had been
chemically treated with fire-retardant, but the compound made skirts yellowish and overly crisp.
Considering that dancers made or broke their careers on such aesthetic decisions,
it's not surprising that Livry declined the treated skirts.
It was only a relatively brief fashion trend, but the hobble skirt proved to be
a serious hindrance to many women. The height of this fashion happened between 1905 and 1910,
when the long, restrictive skirts were so tight at the bottom that they impeded a wearer's gait to a
characteristic hobble. For many, it was merely an annoyance when they wanted to keep up with a group
or make their way from one room to another. But for an unfortunate few, the trend proved deadly.
One such incident recounted in the book Fashion Victims occurred at a race course
near Paris in 1910, when a horse bolted through a crowd. Most people got away,
but one woman was so restricted by her skirt that she remained in the animal's path.
She fell beneath the horse, and with her hair caught in its shoes,
she was dragged along for some period of time. She eventually died of a skull fracture.
And in 1911, the Adelaide, Australia newspaper The Advertiser reported that two women had
died in a boating accident in a Russian resort. The reporter rather harshly blamed
their drowning on the, quote, "imbecile dress" that hobbled them at the knees,
despite their apparent reputation as good swimmers in other outfits.
“How can a woman possibly fight in this?” “Fight? We use our principles.”
Lest you feel smug for being a modern person, living in a world that's mostly
free of arsenic-laced dresses and typhus-laden coats, why don't you go and take a look in your
own closet? Perhaps you've got some ready-made strangulation hazards waiting there for you,
whether it's a fashionable scarf or or your go-to necktie for formal occasions.
These may seem like innocuous accessories, but try telling that to someone like dancer Isadora
Duncan. Except that you can't, because Duncan died in a 1927 car accident when her long,
trailing scarf became entangled around the open axle of a car. When the automobile began rolling,
she was violently pulled from the car by her neck, and died within seconds.
Neckties also have a bit of a deadly history. In 1934, The New York Times
reported on the death of a company manager whose cravat was caught in a machine.
And even as recently as 2001, a New Zealand man suffered a similar fate when his more modern
necktie was caught up in a sanding machine, as reported by The New Zealand Herald. So keep all
this in mind the next time you get dressed, as the life you save could very well be your own.
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