Teenage Girls

Series

Series Name

The March of Time 10th Year

Issue

Issue No.

12

Date Released

1 Oct 1945

Length of issue (in feet)

1550

Stories in this Issue:

1. 1Teenage Girls

Story

Story No. within this Issue

1 / 1

Summary

The March of Time synopsis: In its latest release the March of Time discusses the wartime development of the American adolescent girl, some six million of whom says the film, today constitute one of the most highly individualised and noticeable groups in the country. Business concerns, quick to realise to their profit that teen-agers are consumers with minds of their own, concentrate on giving this exacting clientele what it wants. With the junior miss attracting more and more attention dress buyers for department stores consider it an important part of their jobs to keep in touch with every new trend in teen-age styles. Model agencies are encountering a strong demand for photogenic youngsters, and already a few teen-age models rank as full-fledged "Cover Girls" their faces familiar from coast to coast in advertisements and on magazine covers. Newspaper and periodical writers, finding the public pleasantly agog over the youth of the nation, report their doings in full, while magazines, specially edited to appeal to the adolescent, enjoy enormous circulations.

Sociologists, psychologists and students of behaviourism, says the film, find in the teen-aged girl of today a stimulating and almost limitless field of study - but one in which they are lost without expert guidance. In an attempt to evaluate the teen-age American girl in terms of her likes and dislikes, the film employs a typical adolescent to speak for her generation. She discusses the importance of the right kind of clothes and make-up, which means that they must dress alike and not appear to be ‘different’; their social pursuits and their various ways of earning extra pocket money; one of the most lucratice of which, apparently, is minding somebody’s baby. And most important is a "room of one’s own" to be taken care of and decorated to the owner’s liking. The American father is depicted as long suffering when it comes to the question of telephones, while the whole household is inconvenienced over the matter of bathrooms. But while admitting that her generation may be a little thoughtless at times, the spokeswoman insists that they are not selfish and shallow as older people appear to think. Though to adults in every century and every land, concludes the film, the gulf between youth and mature age has seemed wide and deep, to youth itself it is no permanent obstacle. The buoyant American teen-age girl knows as well as do her parents her future role and responsibility as the American woman of tomorrow, and if the older generation shows patience and understanding, youth’s boundless energy and joy of living will in the end direct itself to serious and useful goals.

Researcher Comments

Len Lye collaborated on this issue according to the BFI Database. This story was included in Vol.11 No.11 of the US edition.

Keywords

Women; Social conditions; Youth

Written sources

Fielding, Raymond. The March of Time 1935-1951 (New York, 1978)   p280.
The March of Time Promotional Material   Lobby Card, Used for synopsis

Credits:

Production Co.

Time Inc.