0:00:03 > 0:00:08In the 1950s, the famous newsreel company, Pathe, produced
0:00:08 > 0:00:11a major historical documentary series for British television.
0:00:11 > 0:00:15Made by the award-winning producer Peter Baylis
0:00:15 > 0:00:18and narrated by an illustrious line-up of celebrated actors,
0:00:18 > 0:00:22Time To Remember chronicled the social, cultural and political forces
0:00:22 > 0:00:26that shaped the first half of the 20th century.
0:00:27 > 0:00:32The series contained several programmes that highlighted the shifting status of women.
0:00:32 > 0:00:36The details of the progress made towards equality during the era
0:00:36 > 0:00:40paint a vivid picture of a fascinating time.
0:00:47 > 0:00:50# Come into the garden, Maud
0:00:50 > 0:00:55# For the black bat, night, has flown
0:00:55 > 0:00:58# Come into the garden, Maud
0:00:58 > 0:01:01# I am here at the gate alone... #
0:01:01 > 0:01:06Things, faces, friends, places.
0:01:06 > 0:01:10Years and moments half-forgotten.
0:01:10 > 0:01:17Laughs, fears, songs, tears, memories are made of this.
0:01:43 > 0:01:47I remember a time, oh, so long ago.
0:01:47 > 0:01:51A time when women at last emerged from their shells,
0:01:51 > 0:01:56if that's the proper phrase, and took the bit between their teeth.
0:01:56 > 0:01:59And what a disturbance it made,
0:01:59 > 0:02:03but most of them wouldn't have missed it for the world.
0:02:05 > 0:02:11The role women played in British society was transformed during the first half of the 20th century.
0:02:13 > 0:02:18Back in 1900, women were politically disenfranchised and expected to defer,
0:02:18 > 0:02:22first to their fathers and later to their husbands.
0:02:22 > 0:02:27Slow, gentle, stately and reticent.
0:02:27 > 0:02:33And that description, by the way, happens to sum up how we women were supposed to be at the time.
0:02:33 > 0:02:41When unmarried or being courted, just beauty queens, gorgeous, decorative and dumb.
0:02:41 > 0:02:44When married, matronly and motherly.
0:02:44 > 0:02:49In either state, seen, admired, but not heard.
0:02:49 > 0:02:53History dictated that it was the other sex
0:02:53 > 0:02:58that was supposed to have all the brains, do all the thinking and voting.
0:02:58 > 0:03:02And how pompous the men were in their masculine authority.
0:03:02 > 0:03:06"I'm a self-made man and master in my own house,
0:03:06 > 0:03:12"and if my wife so much as... But she doesn't, she knows her place."
0:03:12 > 0:03:16Late Victorian women were constrained by rigid social conventions.
0:03:16 > 0:03:23"Ladies do not at any time swing on swings. On Sunday too.
0:03:23 > 0:03:30"Aggy Smith, tonight at supper, I shall speak to your father."
0:03:30 > 0:03:35But even while the Queen still lived, there were signs of change,
0:03:35 > 0:03:40signs of women breaking out of the prison of home and strict respectability.
0:03:40 > 0:03:46I ask you, mixed cycling! Oh, the country's going to the dogs, six at a time.
0:03:47 > 0:03:53The call for women's suffrage began to take hold during the reign of Queen Victoria,
0:03:53 > 0:03:59but by the time George V came to the throne in 1910, little real headway had been made.
0:03:59 > 0:04:03By 1911, there were quite a few women, the Pankhurst family among them,
0:04:03 > 0:04:08who were beginning to get restless with this state of affairs.
0:04:08 > 0:04:12Those chairs are being carried in to one of their early meetings.
0:04:12 > 0:04:14Not so many chairs,
0:04:14 > 0:04:17for then the suffragettes were few in number.
0:04:17 > 0:04:20Votes for women then seemed like reaching for the moon.
0:04:23 > 0:04:29How the world jeered and laughed at those first brave few.
0:04:29 > 0:04:36But undaunted, they girded up...well, whatever it was that women girded up in those days, and marched on,
0:04:36 > 0:04:39supremely confident in their ultimate victory.
0:04:39 > 0:04:45What did the politicians do about these female demonstrations? Little to nothing, I'm afraid.
0:04:45 > 0:04:49The British Prime Minister at the time was Mr Asquith
0:04:49 > 0:04:54and you know what he was famous for saying - "wait and see".
0:04:54 > 0:04:58Well to the fore was a fighting Welsh Liberal, David Lloyd George,
0:04:58 > 0:05:03but he was too busy with National Insurance and other schemes.
0:05:04 > 0:05:06One man was deeply sympathetic.
0:05:06 > 0:05:10George Lansbury was always battling for the Pankhursts.
0:05:10 > 0:05:18Strange, really, for they were anything but socialists, but then the cause rose above party politics.
0:05:18 > 0:05:24Yet whatever support the suffragettes found or didn't find, each fresh opening of the British Parliament
0:05:24 > 0:05:30saw their case either off the agenda or so near the bottom as to make no difference.
0:05:30 > 0:05:31Votes for women, indeed.
0:05:31 > 0:05:36Things like naval estimates were much more important.
0:05:38 > 0:05:41This struggle for women's voting rights was being played out
0:05:41 > 0:05:44against the backdrop of social unrest across the country.
0:05:44 > 0:05:51Britain was a deeply class-riven society, with huge disparities of wealth, living conditions and power.
0:05:51 > 0:05:55The momentum was building for social reforms across class and gender.
0:05:55 > 0:06:00The fight for suffrage was symptomatic of this rejection of the old order.
0:06:02 > 0:06:071912, and the suffragettes still on the march
0:06:07 > 0:06:10but, by now, the ranks have indeed swelled
0:06:10 > 0:06:15and thousands of Aunt Agathas go forward together to battle for female emancipation.
0:06:15 > 0:06:20By now, they have the support of the universities and the intellectuals,
0:06:20 > 0:06:23and the movement knows no division of class or privilege,
0:06:23 > 0:06:27for in it are the lowest and the highest.
0:06:27 > 0:06:32And being the pioneers, the whole world has its eye on them.
0:06:32 > 0:06:37March on, brave women of Britain, you've nothing to lose but your chains.
0:06:37 > 0:06:42Always in history, it is the pioneers who suffer for ultimate victory.
0:06:42 > 0:06:45By 1913, the cause was becoming more strident,
0:06:45 > 0:06:49with some factions of the movement adopting a more militant approach.
0:06:49 > 0:06:54A nation wondering what the world is coming to looks on anxiously
0:06:54 > 0:06:59as, in great mass meetings, the women present their case forcefully.
0:06:59 > 0:07:02Now comes a parting of the ways,
0:07:02 > 0:07:08for while some still preach gradual change, others demand war to the knife,
0:07:08 > 0:07:13insist that all's fair in the fight for female rights.
0:07:14 > 0:07:18For the militant, the war moves into the streets.
0:07:18 > 0:07:22Everywhere, suffragettes throw stones, shout,
0:07:22 > 0:07:27chain themselves to railings and resist everything including arrest.
0:07:27 > 0:07:34Off to jail they go in their hundreds, there to endure hunger strikes and then forced feedings.
0:07:34 > 0:07:36Votes for women.
0:07:39 > 0:07:44The houses of leading political opponents go up in flames.
0:07:44 > 0:07:50By any means, foul as well as fair, is the battle fought.
0:07:50 > 0:07:55Then comes the day of the Derby at Epsom in 1913,
0:07:55 > 0:08:00as always attended by the King and Queen and enthusiastic thousands.
0:08:04 > 0:08:07The race starts like any other,
0:08:07 > 0:08:11but when the horses reach Tattenham Corner, there comes a shock.
0:08:11 > 0:08:13A woman runs out.
0:08:13 > 0:08:15There is a fall.
0:08:17 > 0:08:20The King's horse and Emily Davison lie on the turf.
0:08:24 > 0:08:29Suffragette Emily Davison is out of the race for good.
0:08:29 > 0:08:31Poor, brave little Emily.
0:08:31 > 0:08:38It has been said that suffering from some incurable disease, she was doomed to die anyway.
0:08:38 > 0:08:42But that does not detract from her courage in hurling herself
0:08:42 > 0:08:46under pounding hooves to demonstrate that even weak women can die for a cause.
0:08:50 > 0:08:55Slow march for Emily Davison.
0:08:56 > 0:09:04And so the world enjoys its last summer of peace, unaware for the most part that Armageddon awaits,
0:09:04 > 0:09:11unaware that the death of poor little Emily Davison is just one more nail in the coffin of the old order.
0:09:11 > 0:09:17For war or no war, the suffragettes continue to march
0:09:17 > 0:09:21and dear Aunt Agatha continues to sit it out,
0:09:21 > 0:09:27confident as ever that victory is near, as indeed it is.
0:09:28 > 0:09:34In fact, it took another five years and a world war until female property owners over the age of 30
0:09:34 > 0:09:36were finally granted the vote in 1918.
0:09:36 > 0:09:41Women were only enfranchised on the same terms as men in 1928.
0:09:41 > 0:09:48In 1919, Lady Astor made history as the first woman to take her seat as a member of the House of Commons.
0:09:48 > 0:09:50This might not have been possible
0:09:50 > 0:09:57without the immense contribution women had made on the home front during the Great War.
0:09:57 > 0:10:01World War I effected a revolution in the lives of women of all classes.
0:10:03 > 0:10:08Their mass employment in jobs, previously the sole preserve of men
0:10:08 > 0:10:13and the subsequent altered perception of women's capabilities was to have lasting ramifications.
0:10:16 > 0:10:20On the windows of the great industrial towns of Britain,
0:10:20 > 0:10:26the rapping of the dawn knocker-up called the faithful to their lathes and drop hammers.
0:10:26 > 0:10:31A Britain where now the women were taking the places of the men,
0:10:31 > 0:10:34a Britain where the babies played in the arms of their nurses
0:10:34 > 0:10:38while their mothers bent over machines and work benches,
0:10:38 > 0:10:43a Britain at last fully gearing herself to modern war.
0:10:46 > 0:10:48That was where Aunt Maud came in.
0:10:48 > 0:10:51What would have happened to the Allied offensives of 1917
0:10:51 > 0:10:55without Aunt Maud just doesn't bear thinking about.
0:11:00 > 0:11:04Enough men at the front had come to mean women taking over at the back.
0:11:04 > 0:11:08While Uncle Harry was away, Aunt Mabel worked on a laundry van.
0:11:11 > 0:11:14That Mrs Higgins at No 9 was a tram conductress.
0:11:14 > 0:11:20As Aunt Mable said, it was nice to see her keeping on the rails.
0:11:20 > 0:11:26Mrs Higgins' friends Phoeb was bashing the front doors as a postwoman
0:11:26 > 0:11:31and the two Ramsbottom sisters were throwing parcels about the wrong way up at the station.
0:11:31 > 0:11:36And as well as them, there were women guards and women wheel dabbers.
0:11:38 > 0:11:42I don't know whether you ever wound up one of those old lorries.
0:11:42 > 0:11:45Sometimes they kicked back like a mule.
0:11:45 > 0:11:51But with Mrs Jones, well, woe betide them if they so much as coughed.
0:11:51 > 0:11:57And to think that only a year or so before in Britain, we'd been refusing them the vote.
0:11:57 > 0:12:02To refuse some of them by 1917 was to ask for a bat over the bonce with a clanking handle.
0:12:02 > 0:12:06They were doing the jobs and sometimes even showing the men how to do them.
0:12:06 > 0:12:11I tell you, it was a grim moment for the male sex.
0:12:13 > 0:12:15Look at 'em.
0:12:15 > 0:12:18Look at 'em, in 1917.
0:12:18 > 0:12:24What the world was going to be like after the war, Mrs Higgins' husband just shuddered to think.
0:12:25 > 0:12:30# Keep the home fires burning
0:12:30 > 0:12:35# While your hearts are yearning
0:12:35 > 0:12:40# Though your lads are far away They dream... #
0:12:40 > 0:12:43The socio-political changes women were experiencing
0:12:43 > 0:12:47were reflected in the gradual transformation of women's styles of dress.
0:12:50 > 0:12:56At the turn of the century, fashions were already beginning to lose some of the strict Victorian severity.
0:12:56 > 0:12:58Hats were still a must,
0:12:58 > 0:13:03but the increased physical activity of the modern woman's life meant clothing loosened up, a bit.
0:13:03 > 0:13:07There's something to put on for every occasion.
0:13:07 > 0:13:13The best for sport for, by now, sport, in small degree, was considered acceptable for ladies.
0:13:13 > 0:13:20By 1919, newly enfranchised, and having kept the country functioning during the First World War,
0:13:20 > 0:13:26women were reluctant to surrender the social and economic freedoms they had so recently won.
0:13:26 > 0:13:30Women's increased self-confidence was evident in their public behaviour.
0:13:30 > 0:13:33The etiquette of stringent respectability eased
0:13:33 > 0:13:36and gave way to an independence and informality
0:13:36 > 0:13:40that would have been unrecognisable to previous generations.
0:13:40 > 0:13:43Unsurprisingly, it also impacted on their wardrobes.
0:13:47 > 0:13:50The more relaxed fashions of the '20s
0:13:50 > 0:13:53saw hemlines rise...
0:13:54 > 0:13:57..and hairstyles shorten.
0:13:58 > 0:14:01The new trends demanded a new body shape.
0:14:01 > 0:14:06So widespread was the desire to achieve the fashionable flat look of the '20s flapper-girl
0:14:06 > 0:14:12that Pathe chronicled the phenomenon in the figure of an upper-class English girl, Daphne.
0:14:14 > 0:14:20If you wanted to have the boyish figure that was getting to be the rage - to be hipless and bustless -
0:14:20 > 0:14:24try a couple of terms at St Winnie's. They'd fine you down there properly.
0:14:32 > 0:14:35Steady, girls, don't overdo it.
0:14:35 > 0:14:41Because it was the '20s and women were all out to refute the fact that it was a man's world,
0:14:41 > 0:14:46there seemed great emphasis on sport and cricket, of all things, in particular.
0:14:46 > 0:14:48Daphne's games mistress used to say
0:14:48 > 0:14:54that a straight bat through life fears no fast bowlers,
0:14:54 > 0:14:57and Miss Horsfall ought to know. I mean, look at her.
0:14:57 > 0:15:05I suppose they felt that a girl ought to have a few muscles to give her a head start in life.
0:15:05 > 0:15:11Worth's of Paris in 1924 said, "Women's fondness for sport fixes the presence of the, er, contour."
0:15:11 > 0:15:15Well, the contours were certainly different, one had to admit that.
0:15:15 > 0:15:17Freer, you might say.
0:15:19 > 0:15:22Even at Deauville,
0:15:22 > 0:15:25the same emphasis on keeping slim and maintaining the flat look.
0:15:25 > 0:15:27Physical training to get down those curves
0:15:27 > 0:15:32and achieve a chest like the front of a tramcar, that was the target.
0:15:40 > 0:15:47Hard work to become flat both in front and behind, that was the motto for young and old, the light...
0:15:47 > 0:15:50and the heavy. Terribly good for you too...I-I suppose.
0:16:11 > 0:16:16But there does seem to have been some debate about the long-term effects
0:16:16 > 0:16:19of all this physical activity on the sporting female.
0:16:19 > 0:16:26Lenglen, Suzanne, French, but tennis champion of England from 1919 to 1923.
0:16:26 > 0:16:29If normalcy for women meant back to the kitchen,
0:16:29 > 0:16:35then Suzanne and the other ladies of her ilk were heading full tilt in the opposite direction.
0:16:35 > 0:16:38They were everywhere. From the tennis club to the Olympic Games.
0:16:38 > 0:16:43The weaker sex, look at them, and they still wanted a seat in the bus.
0:16:47 > 0:16:50Just about this time, a committee was set up
0:16:50 > 0:16:55to collect information on the sterility of the sporting type of woman.
0:16:55 > 0:17:00The vital issue at stake was, would these strenuous games impair the natural function of motherhood?
0:17:02 > 0:17:05For future generations to be or not to be - that was the question.
0:17:13 > 0:17:20All the new freedoms of the '20s seemed epitomised in the person of Hollywood actress Mary Pickford.
0:17:22 > 0:17:25The world's sweetheart, they called her,
0:17:25 > 0:17:31and to many Mary Pickford personified that whole first generation of really free women
0:17:31 > 0:17:36ready to do any man's job, and maybe do it even better.
0:17:36 > 0:17:42Already, those who had worked the fields and factories during the recent war
0:17:42 > 0:17:47were seeking fresh pastures in mass emigrations to Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
0:17:47 > 0:17:52Already, there were women lawyers, women doctors and even women dentists.
0:17:52 > 0:17:57Alice Delysia shocked some when she kicked off at a football match,
0:17:57 > 0:18:00but a few titters of disapproval couldn't stem such a tide,
0:18:00 > 0:18:06no sir...or madam. Suddenly on the sports fields, there were women centre forwards,
0:18:06 > 0:18:10goalkeepers, right backs, left backs...and better halves.
0:18:10 > 0:18:15Women had spotted their goals and were now all out to get them.
0:18:19 > 0:18:25Gone with the wind of war were the ladies of Victorian and Edwardian England,
0:18:25 > 0:18:28the ladies that once would have bathed only when covered from head to toe.
0:18:28 > 0:18:35Now the beaches of Britain were displaying, well, more than any respectable woman should,
0:18:35 > 0:18:41splashing about as though in the privacy of their own bathrooms, the shameless hussies.
0:18:41 > 0:18:49Yes, women had their behinds in the saddle and their feet on the pedals and there was no stopping them.
0:18:49 > 0:18:53In the race for superiority, men were hard pressed even to catch up.
0:18:53 > 0:19:00With such expanded horizons, it seemed the future opportunities for our flapper were limitless.
0:19:00 > 0:19:06When it came to careers, Daphne's mummy didn't quite realise that these were the '20s,
0:19:06 > 0:19:08and the '20s were different. "Oh, Mummy, I don't need a chaperone!"
0:19:16 > 0:19:21Yes, the '20s had brought a whole new set of careers for women.
0:19:21 > 0:19:25A little unconventional, but careers all the same.
0:19:25 > 0:19:28Why, only the other day
0:19:28 > 0:19:33they had a visit to London from that American flying girl, what was her name? Oh, yes, Amelia Earhart.
0:19:43 > 0:19:45Then there was Britain's own Amy Johnson.
0:19:45 > 0:19:49There seemed nothing that women weren't doing nowadays.
0:19:53 > 0:19:59Going off on long car expeditions to Africa or India or China.
0:19:59 > 0:20:03How can they do it? I mean, the inconvenience and the discomfort!
0:20:09 > 0:20:13A women's world, that's what it was now.
0:20:17 > 0:20:22The social trends begun after the First World War continued into the '30s,
0:20:22 > 0:20:27although the flat look, so characteristic of the flapper, found its moment had passed.
0:20:31 > 0:20:34The '30s. Did the girls look as nice?
0:20:34 > 0:20:37Well, being younger then, they all looked nice to me.
0:20:37 > 0:20:44Just breaking out of the severe masculine styles of the '20s and returning to basic...femininity.
0:20:49 > 0:20:53Pretty good stuff, really, and those beach pyjamas!
0:20:58 > 0:21:04After all the mannish horrors of the '20s, a return to the strictly feminine.
0:21:04 > 0:21:06For the boys, a very welcome change indeed.
0:21:10 > 0:21:15The girls no longer tried to look boyish, thank heaven, but did everything to emphasise their sex.
0:21:15 > 0:21:19The sale of cosmetics boomed.
0:21:19 > 0:21:25For every lipstick sold ten years before, now 1,500 were being disposed of.
0:21:25 > 0:21:28Just wipe that smile off your face.
0:21:32 > 0:21:38Someone has said that the new fashions of the '30s were a harkening back to the Victorian era,
0:21:38 > 0:21:42expressing a nostalgia for the secure life of those bygone times.
0:21:42 > 0:21:47Well, be that as it may, things certainly underwent great change.
0:21:47 > 0:21:50In place of the old flat-chested cylindrical look,
0:21:50 > 0:21:56flowing lines, leg of mutton sleeves, chirpy hats to reveal coquettishly one side of the head.
0:22:01 > 0:22:05But though elaborate, this garb was essentially practical.
0:22:05 > 0:22:08Those new zip fasteners saw to that.
0:22:08 > 0:22:12Curves may have been back in vogue, but the fashion for keep-fit hadn't diminished.
0:22:12 > 0:22:16Health and beauty, that was the general title.
0:22:16 > 0:22:19Some women I knew went for years.
0:22:19 > 0:22:21They got healthy anyway - you can't have everything.
0:22:21 > 0:22:24Bring your leg over, Nelly!
0:22:37 > 0:22:42It certainly entailed doing all sorts of things that you wouldn't normally indulge in,
0:22:42 > 0:22:47but you know what women are once they get an idea into their heads, there's no stopping them.
0:22:47 > 0:22:50..Four, five, six and snap!
0:22:50 > 0:22:53One, two, three, four, one, two, down, pom-pi-dom, pom-pi-tiddly-om.
0:22:53 > 0:22:57Tiddly-tiddly-om, tiddly-om-pom-pom.
0:22:57 > 0:23:01Tiddly-ompi-dom-pi-dom, one, two, three, four, diddly diddly...
0:23:01 > 0:23:07In the original Time To Remember, Sally Smith characterises the "everygirl" of the 1930s,
0:23:07 > 0:23:11exploring all the new avenues now open to her.
0:23:11 > 0:23:15Sally Smith was more likely than not a working girl now,
0:23:15 > 0:23:20employing her nimble fingers along those selfsame mass production lines.
0:23:20 > 0:23:25And no matter how routine the job was, she seldom seemed to get bored with it.
0:23:29 > 0:23:32Every day saw her entering into new occupations.
0:23:32 > 0:23:39In such a time of mass unemployment, it was a wonder that men weren't more often up in arms about it.
0:23:39 > 0:23:43But then a pretty face can often give quite a boost to sales.
0:23:43 > 0:23:47As travelling at high speeds seemed to be the first recreation of the new age,
0:23:47 > 0:23:49Sally Smith had to get into that too.
0:23:49 > 0:23:57Well, if Amy Johnson could build her own plane, fly it and service it, why shouldn't Sally?
0:23:57 > 0:24:00Even in the '30s, there were still plenty of places to fly to
0:24:00 > 0:24:07and, in the process, break a record and win yourself a newspaper prize of, say, £10,000.
0:24:07 > 0:24:10So nobody could claim it wasn't worth a candle.
0:24:10 > 0:24:17But whatever they claimed, Sally would still have gone her own sweet way, so what was the use?
0:24:17 > 0:24:23That was the spirit in which Sally Smith got into everything, and we mean everything.
0:24:28 > 0:24:32Marriage didn't seem to make any difference.
0:24:32 > 0:24:34With all those mass-produced devices
0:24:34 > 0:24:41to help with the washing up, cooking and cleaning, there was no knowing where Mrs Sally Smith might end up.
0:24:41 > 0:24:45"No time for whist today, dear, got a rally tomorrow.
0:24:45 > 0:24:48"Must get the old bike tuned up first."
0:24:54 > 0:24:58Yes, they were an adventurous lot, no denying it.
0:24:58 > 0:25:03The first Great War had been the start of women taking over men's jobs.
0:25:03 > 0:25:06Now it looked as though only another and greater war between the sexes could put an end to the trend.
0:25:08 > 0:25:11Whoever it was who said that little piece about harkening back
0:25:11 > 0:25:15to the Victorian era was on rather shaky ground, if you ask me.
0:25:15 > 0:25:17It certainly couldn't be claimed
0:25:17 > 0:25:22that these young ladies were expressing any nostalgia for the safe and secure.
0:25:22 > 0:25:28No doubt about it, the '30s had introduced a very new era indeed.
0:25:35 > 0:25:37With the advent of the Second World War,
0:25:37 > 0:25:41women once again stepped up to the breach,
0:25:41 > 0:25:46returning en masse to the production lines and taking on traditionally male occupations
0:25:46 > 0:25:49in more diverse and visible roles than ever before.
0:25:49 > 0:25:53The hair once again got shorter, but this time for practical reasons.
0:25:53 > 0:25:56Just about then, they brought in the Victory hairstyle for women,
0:25:56 > 0:26:03not so much a style, really, as a chopping off to prevent the locks being caught up in the works.
0:26:03 > 0:26:07For the women who worked the machines that made the things that were going to win the war
0:26:07 > 0:26:09didn't have much time for frills.
0:26:09 > 0:26:13Day shift, night shift, overtime, double time...
0:26:13 > 0:26:19The significance of women's mass contribution was such, they even started writing songs about it.
0:26:19 > 0:26:24# ..That works the thingummy bob
0:26:24 > 0:26:26# It's the girl that makes the thing
0:26:26 > 0:26:28# That drills the hole that holds the ring
0:26:28 > 0:26:31# That makes the thingummy bob
0:26:31 > 0:26:34# That makes the engines roar
0:26:34 > 0:26:38# And it's the girl that makes the thing
0:26:38 > 0:26:41# That holds the oil that oils the ring
0:26:41 > 0:26:46# That makes the thingummy bob that's going to win the war!
0:26:51 > 0:26:54# It is, an' all! #
0:26:54 > 0:26:59The journey women had taken in less than 50 years was dramatic.
0:26:59 > 0:27:04From social repression and political exclusion to keeping the home fires burning
0:27:04 > 0:27:08and the home front functioning, this first generation of 20th-century women
0:27:08 > 0:27:13had fought the good fight for greater independence and embraced its expanded horizons.
0:27:13 > 0:27:19The Great War brought women into the workplace in numbers and occupations never seen before.
0:27:19 > 0:27:25Their contribution to the war effort profoundly altered perceptions of women's capabilities,
0:27:25 > 0:27:28and is said to have influenced their political enfranchisement.
0:27:28 > 0:27:35New economic freedom, increased confidence and growing opportunity instilled in women
0:27:35 > 0:27:41a sense of self-determination which was to be played out in the roaring '20s and early '30s.
0:27:43 > 0:27:48By the outset of the Second World War, there was no question that women would once again
0:27:48 > 0:27:52take up the mantle and keep the country running while the men were away.
0:27:52 > 0:27:58The pioneering women of the early 20th century were an inspiration for those that followed.
0:27:58 > 0:28:03The freedoms they fought for created a momentum for change and a demand for equality
0:28:03 > 0:28:08that would alter fundamentally the lives of generations of women to come.