Women’s fashion has represented a larger context with its changing styles throughout history. Newtown Historical Society will walk down the runway with those styles and their larger environment in a program in conjunction with C.H. Booth Library on Monday, April 8.

Presented by Mallory Huron, “From Gibson Girl to Fabulous Flappers” will begin at 7:30 pm in the lower meeting room of the library, 25 Main Street.

World War I had a profound effect on personal views of the world, including the place of women and men within it. Women were hired to work in defense factories, and the more adventurous traveled overseas as nurses and other military auxiliaries.

Within two years of the end of the war, this newfound freedom and sense of place led to the goal of a more than 70-year struggle to obtain the vote for women.

The economy was booming, a chicken was promised to every pot, and women and men felt both the exuberance of the war’s end and the fear of having looked into the abyss of its cataclysmic devastation of life and property.

Ms Huron will take the audience from Charles Dana Gibson’s idealized “Girl” of the Edwardian era through the New Woman of the Flapper period. She will divide the nearly 30-year span into five distinct periods, introducing each with a look at the pertinent historical events as well as the general culture of the period, and then relate them to the changes in women’s fashion.

She will also discuss the trends of the time and relate them to popular fashion, offering an appreciation as well as a deeper understanding of the key changes differentiating the eras.

A historical fashion enthusiast, Mallory Huron lives in Trumbull. She is a trustee of Trumbull Historical Society and has put her personal historical interest to good use in presenting this lecture to a number of local groups.

Newtown Historical Society programs are free and open to the public. Refreshments will be served following the program.

Reservations are not needed, but additional information is available by calling 203-426-5937 or visiting newtownhistory.org.