BEACH COSTUMES

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 19732, 29 December 1926, Page 9

BEACH COSTUMES

MELBOURNE CONTROVERSY. COUNCILS ORDER NECK-TO-KNEE SUITS. SYDNEY, Dec. 2. A controversy is raging in Melbourne regarding the drastic bctich regulations adopted by various suburban councils with jurisdiction round the foreshores of Hobson 7 s Bay. While the regulations have aroused regular patrons of the beach, most of them estimable citizens, to a state bordering upon petty rebellion, the “war” has provided much amusement for the ]ighter-mind- ' cd. With the advent of every summer, there is alweys a move by the worthy : councillors to adopt the stand of guardians of beach purity and modessty and to lessen the length of limb to be exposed to the sun's wJarmth. They do it by ordering bathers to be clothed in neck-to-knee costumes. Loitering on the beach in costume is forbidden, and thus the would-be sun-bather is prevented from enjoying the delicious sensation of the sun putting a healthy casing of brown on shoulders, legs, and arms. There are humorous sidelights in Melbourne's beach war, which the majority of Sydney folk, always supremely contemptuous of the southern city, regard as typifying the spirit of Melbourne, which they look upon not so much as the Victorian capital, as the mid-Victorian capital. For instance, someone wants a definition of a neck-to-knee costume. After interviewing sundry town clerks and other officials of bumbledom, he came to the conclusion that it was something that clothed the limbs from the neck, but not necessarily to the top of the neck, to the top of the calf. Then, perserving man, he searched the Melbourne shops to find the neck-to-knee costume as prescribed .and succeeded —the city's modern emporiums dug from their stacks of natty one-piece abbreviated costumes one that really did reach

■ from neck to knee. Strongly smelling ' of camphor, the owner of the shop confessed that it htui been “left over” for almost two decades. The strange part of Melbourne’s beach war is that nobody seems to want • neck-to-knee costumes. Officials of lifei saving clubs describe them as “suicide” costumes, because not only are ■they h. source of inconvenience and dis{comfort to the wearer, but are a posiitive danger, as many of the costumes : become neck-to-ankle costumes in the i water, and so hamper the movements |of poor swimmers. Even such organisations as the Housewives’ Association land the Women’s Christian Temperance iUnion have joined in the wide protests ; against the official ban on one-piece [costumes, though the union, it is true, (supports the edict against promiscuous sun-bathing. One newspaper is conI ducting a particularly intense campaign ‘against the council’s order, which it j classes as an absurdity twenty years ■ dead. This paper is responsible for the I serious statement that bathing is rapid- ■ ly becoming less popular in Melbourne, on I account of the ridiculous hampering ; of beach patrons. Here in Sydney more freedom is al'lnwed bathers. One-piece costumes are i the rule, and two-piece suits pre-date i the war. Competent observers believe i that behavior on our beaches has not ‘ suffered because costumes end above The middle of the thigh, have deep V- : shaped necks, and allow freedom to use i the shoulders by having only shoulder i straps. Still even Sydney has its little [troubles, for at Cronulla shorts must ’ be worn b ythe men and kimonos by the women when on the beach, while at Manly there is a regulation, honoured only in the breach, forbidding sunbathing. That regulation came into force, and was openly defied, and after several futile efforts to force its observance by prosecutions, the worthy city fathers decided to wink the other eye, and thus maintain the beach’s popularity- Hut no beach hlas had the temerity to follow Melbourne suburbs’ lead and order two-pieee neck-to-knee costumes.