The Rise and Fall of the Vintage Pin Up Girls

The era of the vintage pin up girls is generally accepted as starting from the late 1930s and lasting until the early 1960s. Representations of the female form have always been a popular form of art, from the day that prehistoric man first picked up a piece of charcoal and drew his mate on a cave wall, but it was to be many millions of years later before it became a form of commercial pop art.

It can reasonably be assumed that the popularity of the pinup girl as we know her grew in line with the development of the popular media, and the movies were likely the start of it all. The famous stars were often given nicknames, such as Clara Bow (the 'It Girl'), the 'Blonde Bombshell', Jean Harlow and Lana Turner, known as 'the Sweater Girl'. Their photographs were also much prized, because cameras were not the domain of the ordinary person in the earlier parts of the 20th century.

Had you lived during these early years in the development of cinematography and photography, the representations of your favorite stars would have been much sought after. You would have prized a photograph of your favorite movie star, although you would not have recognized it as being a 'pin up' because the term did not become part of the English language until 1941.

In fact, the era of the vintage pin up girls really kicked off with the Second World War in Europe in 1939 and Asia in 1941, when first the British and then the American forces pinned photographs of their favorite stars to their barrack walls, locker doors and even to the sides of their foxholes and trenches during battle.