So back in the 50s my grandfather shot some 35mm. It's a fascinating look back into rural Utah and farm life. There is a scene showing a typical mormon family dinner with all the grandkids, right after church, the ladies are wearing the latest fashions, attractive 'sleeveless' dresses (with garments probably pinned up?) with what looks to me like petticoats and girdles and cat rimmed glasses. The men have on rather loud colors and off white shirts, and loud patterns as well. Their sleeves and all rolled up too. Then there is a scene of skinny dipping kiddos in a plastic swimming pool. Gasp!

Sensibilities of modesty sure have changed! somehow it's all become corporate. All the men have to wear the same suits and the same white shirts, Ladies cannot wear sleeveless anything anymore. They'll be run out of the building if they do.

How did it get like this? My theory is that it has to do with push back on growing diversity. That the hierarchy was uncomfortable with the multiculturalism that grew in the 1970's. Through appearances they could make everyone conform to one culture.

Thoughts?

https://www.google.com/search?q=1950s+dresses&rlz=1C1CHZL_enUS734US734&tbm=isch&source=iu&ictx=1&fir=SjNyGM3TLlLaqM%253A%252ClAyYUAv9KNgueM%252C_&vet=1&usg=AI4_-kSH0ERk61JbLzfN0JNFRBf7ULWXjw&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi846-b-KbmAhUCWa0KHeThC4oQ9QEwD3oECAUQTg#imgrc=SjNyGM3TLlLaqM:

I'm still working on carbon dating...

I think that was from a different post from this earlier today EOD? LOL! :)

I remember in the 60s and 70s wearing colored shirts to church.

I had maroon, beige, blue and a beautiful tan and brown shirt with gold threads.

In the 70s, for a few years, we wore turtlecks with a jacket and no tie.

There was a time I wore bolo ties too.

I think it was McKay that said there was no "uniform of the priesthood."

Somewhere around the late 70s it seems we had to wear regular ties to bless and pass the sacrament.

Sometime after that white shirts were "suggested" for Aaronic Priesthood though adult men wore colored and often striped shirts.

I left in the early 80s so don't know when everyone changed.

Nice catch.

I can't believe that we used to be members of The Church of Jesus Christ of IBM Middle Managers.

Funny. My oldest brother was in England on business in the mid-80's when a guy he met said "from the look of your suit you either work for IBM or are a mormon". He said "I'm both" and they had a good laugh over it.

That is amusing.

I used to live in Cincinnati, OH. It was then the corporate home of both Procter & Gamble, for whom my now-ex worked, and IBM. Walking around downtown Cincinnati sometimes was like visiting a clone factory. P&G was just as severe about dress and appearance standards as IBM.

I will never forget the look of unguarded shock on my now-ex's face when he came to my office to take me to lunch one day. We both worked downtown, within a block or two of each other. He was stunned by the assortment of off-the-wall Looney Tunes that often made up our waiting room at Social Security. The lady with three wigs happened to be there that day, too. She wore the wigs (of differing lengths, colors and styles) on top of each other, rather like a hairy ice-cream cone.

For someone who lived as a corporate clone, this was a fairly severe culture shock. For us at Social Security, it was just part of our day-to-day reality.

When I got back from my mission (1978), I was asked to report my mission to the Stake High Council at their meeting the following Sunday. I clearly remember that I was the only one in the entire room that was wearing a white shirt.

The variable after the passing of David O McKay and advent of correlation and enforcement with Harold B Lee in 1973 was how close to the epicenter of SLC did you reside. Of course, the death of McKay and the reign of Spencer W. Kimball in 1974 was only slightly over 4 years, and the 18 month of Joseph Fielding Smith was just a place holder...and Lee had been pushing big time for correlation over 30 years, but his mark was made in that short period, as the hard liners took over.

Petersen, Benson, and Packer took the reins and Kimball, Tanner, and Romney were not match) in very poor health. (Packer was called in 1970 as part of the re org of McKay's Presidency upon his death.) Interesting side note, counselor to McKay, Hugh B Brown was kicked to the curb. Now, we see that once again with Dieter O., and Alvin R. Dyer is a different exception, as a counselor, but non apostle.

So, was it the Lord's will or just a matter of he whom had the highest calling card at the moment...seniority and senility.

Interestingly enough trivia, Thomas Monson's sons, Thomas Lee and Clark Spencer are named for Harold B Lee and J. Reuben Clark.

Yes. Peterson Benson and Packer and Lee must have been the ones that pushed mormondom into extreme conformity which pushed the religion in a conservative direction. Young people across the country were protesting the Vietnam war and were pushing the boundaries of social norms, and appearances.

The conservative movement may have had it's earliest beginnings at BYU in the 1960s with president Wilkinson. He was ever enamored by the bretheren in trying to please them in trying to work his way up the corporate ladder, At that time BYU had created strict appearance protocols, and dress standards, he even created a 'secret police' staffed by students to spy on each other and report. The mormon hierarchy supported Vietnam not because they knew what was going on, but because they believed old men always know best and being a conservative is the way for a select few to get ahead and work their way up the hierarchy.

except for the missionaries. The white shirt thing was basically the missionary "uniform" and set them apart from Church civilians. It would have just seemed odd and a bit creepy if the regular church folks all started dressing exactly like missionaries.

Most of the fun for younger people in going to church was wearing fun stuff. A funny necktie, big platform shoes. Clothing styles borrowed from popular movies....

Now, they may just as well mandate that all members wear identical jumpsuits. They've been cultivating a hard cult image for years. They may as well just take the next obvious short step to jumpsuit uniforms--perhaps color-coded to indicate rank.

Splendid !

https://www.vivienofholloway.com/images/1950s-halterneck-red-white-polkadot-dress-p171-13173_medium.jpg

You asked how the church managed to take over and groom the young people to dress ultra-conservatively?

It didn't happen all at once, I think it took a good 10 years to get the church's dress standards to be faithfully followed. I was a young man in the 1980s and saw the heavy indoctrination starting to take place. I remember priests blessing the sacrament in colored and embroidered fancy shirts. Eventually, a white shirt became required (per stake presidency directive) and the yellow shirt guy with long hair ended up in the middle position in front of the sacrament table.

Then there were lots of assigned talks from the youth as well as the young men/ young women presidencies. Throw in quarterly stake priesthood meetings and youth firesides, there were plenty of opportunities to hammer in the so-called friendly reminders of how the church wanted us to dress. At least one talk/presentation at church youth conferences were directed at maintaining the church's standard.

They even took a jab at scouting. One year I went to scout camp in the relatively short, but proper scout shorts(mid thigh was visible). The following year, we were told that are scouting shorts had to have our knee caps covered~ do you see where this was going? I hated those. They were very uncomfortable and we were teased unmerciful to no end.

What I think changed member's perceptions was along the lines that church standards were to never be deviated from in any way. There were times that as kids, it was okay to go outside and play in tank top shirts and short shorts. It was okay in Summer to wear cool and comfortable clothing while working outside. I think it must have been in the 1990s when members took the church's guidance to a whole new level. You shouldn't be shamed into wearing a temple garment modesty suit if you're painting the exterior of your house on a hot day.

As deacons, we did our best to be "judged" unworthy to pass the sacrament. The easiest way was to forget your neck tie. That rarely worked as you were marched over to the bishop's office to wear one of his mega-wide striped ties.

We had a black shoe or dark blue shoe rule. I wore brown hush puppies that caused a fit. Yeah, it got me out of passing that day, but two of my ym advisors called my Mom out of primary (twice) to remind her that I was not properly dressed. That caused my Mom to boil and I got hit and slapped all the way home. I usually was over-dressed at church functions (my choice) because I feared that my Mom would snap.

Humiliation in the quorum meetings for non-compliance was not only tolerated but encouraged by church leaders. You were pressured to conform.

The elite (FP, Q of 12, and the Mormon royalty clustered around them) decided that the local yokels had too much autonomy and sovereignty (as meager as it was even back then).

Efficiency in revenue collection and power maximization through controlling redistribution dictated that the egomaniacs in the Church Office Building needed to embark on an intensified C3 (centralization, concentration and consolidation) program to revamp the management structure of the business corporation that they euphemistically refer to as the "Church of Jesus Christ". The object was to eliminate horizontal/lateral interactions between church members at all levels, and to replace all such relationships with more vertical structures (i.e. resources and obedience flow to the top of the pyramid and the top of the pyramid issues commands and distributes a fraction of collected resources back to the locals in accordance with programs and rules dictated by the top).

In the 1960s they called the program "correlation" and it was managed by a consummate corporate insider/bean counter/human herd manager named Harold B. Lee.


--> "The movement began in 1960, when Harold B. Lee, a member of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of the LDS church, took over a committee formidably titled the All-Church Coordinating Council. Their mandate was to coordinate the curricula of the church’s various programs—youth organizations, Sunday school, and so on—and eliminate overlap. But Lee, a talented administrator and forceful personality, had grander visions than simply curbing waste. Over the next decade, he successfully revamped the church’s organizational chart, consolidating governance in the Quorum of the Twelve and stripping independent authority from the women’s association, the Sunday school, and the youth programs. He also established a system of review for all publications produced in the church, from hymnbooks to Sunday school manuals to periodicals. This material is now surveyed for theological accuracy and adherence to various church goals. If it is given the official stamp of approval it is deemed "correlated.”

https://slate.com/human-interest/2012/04/mormon-correlation-the-bureaucratic-reform-policy-that-redefined-mormon-culture.html

Of course they didn't implement the entire package of totalitarian control in one fell swoop. It had to be done incrementally. But by the time the 1980s came around, and Harold B. Lee's tyrannical successors (e.g. Packer, et al) were in charge, there were rules being issued for every little thing. The color of your shirts, the number of permitted holes in your ear lobes, the extent of your facial hair, the content of remarks that could be made at your funeral ceremony etc., etc.

Like the insane Pharisees that they are, the "Brethren" knew that even though they could not deliver any genuine revelations or inspiration, they could excel at making up petty rules to govern every waking moment of the members' lives. So they did...and they continue to do. BTW, don't call Mormons "Mormons"...just a relatively new rule, among many, that everyone must now obey.

"correlation was born in a collision between the social upheavals of the 1960s and the progressive ideals of the early 20th century...

"Before World War I, Mormons enthusiastically participated in the turn of the century progressive movement, ... and well-meaning volunteers could transform America’s poor and immigrants into productive, assimilated members of the middle class. ... They embraced the Boy Scouts of America, Sunday schools, and youth programs designed to uplift their own. Though the Great Depression and the trenches of two world wars dampened the optimism of the original progressives, Mormons kept the dream alive...

"The other place progressivism survived—in some form, at least—was in the American corporation.... so correlation remade Mormonism in the image of the data-driven American corporation, governed by committees, based on consensus, and institutionally conservative.

"Lee succeeded in producing a church built in this image. When America’s college students began wearing tie-dye and protesting the Vietnam War, Brigham Young University banned facial hair and instituted a formal dress code. When the sexual revolution began, Mormon leaders issued a pamphlet titled For the Strength of Youth"

That's an interesting article that shows how mormonism became conservative because of the desire to homogenize immigrants of the 1920s. I hadn't thought about this connection before. But it's similar to the efforts Henry Ford tried. Where he worked to Americanize the immigrants of the 1920's who came to work on the assembly line. They had strict rules of etiquette, mandatory square dance lessons. Lessons in hygiene. Mormonism also at this time was a progressive movement to uplift the poors social status, but by demanding such conformity they became extreme conservatives in their viewpoints.

This was Harold B. Lees mission with correlation. To get rid of anything different, to weed out heretics. Perhaps we could specualte that any church that grows to quick with diversity runs the risk of falling apart, as was the case with the early Christians which splintered into many different churches all with their own ideas, The bishop/politician in Rome being the one with the biggest and most demanding voice.