Stayfree menstrual panty pad ad, the Netherlands, 1972, in Eva magazine In the early 1970s the American Stayfree and New Freedom pads introduced the modern era in sanitary napkins. They no longer required a belt or complicated underpants (or suspenders!!) to hold a pad in place but used a sticky strip to fix it to the crotch of panties. This European ad for Stayfree contrasts the old belt, which zillions of women hated, with the new sticky panty pad - in this case, a small pad for light days, which the ad emphasizes along with the sticky strip. Look how less bulky the new pad is, at right, compared to the old one. Women had always complained about how big traditional pads were, as here in the influential Gilbreth report to Johnson & Johnson (1927). People would have never seen a woman wear a sanitary napkin belt in an ad in America - perish the thought! - but they would have in Europe as we see here (also here in a Swedish ad for panty pads and here in another Dutch Stayfree panty pad ad). In the past American ads and catalogs offered belts by themselves, not worn. Look at the flowers , which manufacturers often associate with menstruation, almost as if they want to cover up an imaginary smell. "Flowers" is an old term used for menses but probably stems from the French, meaning flow. (See more words and phrases for menstruation.) See a Dutch Stayfree panty pad ad from 1973. A Dutchman kindly sent this scan. See a Dutch Stayfree ad from 1973. List of menstrual belts, underpants & panties on this Web site. © 2006 Harry Finley. It is illegal to reproduce or distribute work on

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