The Official Preppy Handbook: The Original Influencer
Kristin Nilsen 0:00
Just the alligator as an icon on everything, not just your eyesod. Right. Which of course I didn't have. I had a parrot on my whatever. What do you call it if it's not Ji? The J.C. Penney version with the parrot
Speaker 1 0:13
on it.
Michelle Newman 0:29
Welcome to the Pop Culture Preservation Society, the podcast for people born in the big wheel generation who had no boat but really, really, really needed boat shoes.
Kristin Nilsen 0:40
We believe our Gen X childhoods gave us unforgettable songs, stories, characters, and images. And if we don't talk about them, they'll disappear like Marshall Will and Holly on a routine expedition.
Carolyn Cochrane 0:51
And today we'll be saving prep-the look, the lore, and the very specific set of rules that taught us how to look like we weren't trying at all. I'm Carolyn. I'm Kristen.
Michelle Newman 1:04
And I'm Michelle. And we are your pop culture preservationists.
Speaker 1 1:10
I got whale slacks and an alligator shirt and a pair of boat shoes without socks. That's prepping.
Speaker 2 1:18
I got a circle pin on my lapel with an A-line skirt and espadrilles.
Speaker 1 1:23
That's prepping.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:24
Okay, listeners, I have been wanting to do this episode since day one of the Pop Culture Preservation Society. Seriously, if there was a Mount Rushmore of PCPS topics, this one is the one I have been trying to get my hands on for 19 seasons. Here we are, you guys, because in the 1980s, preppy was everything to me-from the sweaters, the button downs, the penny loafers, the pop collars, the boat shoes, the monograms. I wanted a vacation in Martha's Vineyard, and I wanted to drive a Volvo. And then there was the book, the original Preppy handbook, and this book wasn't just something I read or flipped through. It was my Bible. I studied it, I quoted it, I absorbed its rules, its vocabulary, and its very specific worldview. And frankly, like I said before, I have been waiting for 19 seasons to talk about this with you. So, listeners, bear with us. Okay, a little disclaimer that I could go on and on. Not sure Kristen and Michelle want to go on and on. There might be a lot for our Patreon members to hear that might have to hit the cutting room floor. But get ready. And Kristen and Michelle, you'll love knowing this that we crowdsourced for this episode, and I am not alone in my deep passion for this book and this time of the '80s when we were prepped out to the max.
Michelle Newman 2:51
I was about to say, listeners, we are going to need your help reining Carolyn in. Yeah, but I think it's I think there's way more of you listening that are as excited and enthusiastic about preppiness and the official preppy handbook as Carolyn is,
Carolyn Cochrane 3:07
100% Yeah, guys. There were hundreds of comments, and listeners and followers, all of you people that sent those in, I read every single one. So, do not fear. Even if we don't quote you today, I felt seen. They were so good. Yes, they were red. Okay, so today we're going to go back to that decade of popped collars, of the penny loafers, of eyes odds, of LL Bean, Ralph Lauren, Sperry topsiders, and of course that amazing official preppy handbook. We're going to talk about where the whole preppy thing came from and how it went from Ivy League campuses to basically every suburban mall in America? So I want to start off this episode with a question that I have wanted answered for a very very long time, Kristen and Michelle. I want to know: Were you into this whole preppy thing like I was? Were you true preps? Were you prep adjacent, or were you firmly in the no way prep camp? Because I feel like after all these years, I do deserve to know. So, ladies, let's settle this one after all. Michelle, we'll start with you. Where were you on this preppy spectrum?
Michelle Newman 4:17
Well, I think like so many things we discuss here, age plays a really big part in how much we were into something or liked something, right? And keeping in mind, I was 10 when the preppy handbook was published, and then between 10 and 13 when it was in its prime. I don't have the kind of passion and passionate memory that Carolyn does about the actual book. However, the answer to the question was I preppy. Is that between about 1982 and 1985, I sure as shit tried my best. I mean, I had the actual like bass Ouijan penny loafers. That I put a pinny in, and I would wear those with like argyle knee socks and like a little jean mini skirt. I wore crew neck cable knit sweaters with a button down underneath. I would often tie like a little ribbon, like you know, you thread it through the collar so that where the little collar comes up outside your crew neck, I would have like a little bow. I absolutely wore it over my shoulders, like with the jean skirt and the aragile sex. Now, understand, I'm only in about eighth grade, so you know, I had Fair Isle sweaters, a couple of them. One that was like shades of brown because it was my seventh grade, seventh or eighth grade school picture. I'm wearing it, but maybe the biggest piece of evidence is that I not only wore colorful eyes odds, or some people insist that it's just Lacoste. We call them eyes odds. I not only wore them; I layered them, and so I might have a pink one with a light pink with a dark pink, and the collar was popped, or a couple, you know, or a couple of them. I do want though you to listen to, I had to ask my sister Carolyn because she's your age, right? So I, I mean, like exactly. So I had to send her a text and ask her if she had memories of it, and and and as we'll talk later, I do have memories of the book. It just was not my Bible. She says I got the preppy handbook as a 16th birthday gift from my friends Tanya and Cindy, those were her best friends, along with various preppy gifts like alligator shoelaces. She remembers they put like this whole box together for her 16th birthday. So this would have been in 1981, which is, I mean, prime preppy handbook, right? So she got the book, and they put it together with the alligator shoe laces, a pink journal with the alligator, the eyesight alligator on the front. She says she still has it, a big button with the alligator that says, in all caps, "Love to eat them preppies. She said it was a very alligator-themed birthday, and I just want to say this because I know some of you listening grew up in Portland, Oregon, or Vancouver, Washington, or near Portland, Oregon. And when she texted me this next part, I was so hooster dude, I about vomited. I want to see if I want to ask those of you listening if you grew up in Portland or adjacent. If you remember this, she said all of these things came from that shop in the Portland Galleria called P.S. I Love You, that you loved, like I, Michelle. She remembers you loved that store, and she said it's where they sold stickers, shoelaces, books, trendy stuff, all the little band buttons for your jean jackets. And when I, when she just wrote in the text that store in the Portland Galleria called P.S. I love you. I about lost my mind. Like I'm getting goosebumps right now, and I want to go shop there so badly. And what's funny is, 57 year old Michelle would love it just as like I still love stores like that. Like that whole that whole trend of I'm the girl, I'm the girl I am now because of the girl I used to be or the woman, whatever.
Michelle Newman 8:02
I haven't changed at all because I still love all that kind of stuff. But but I thought that was funny, Carolyn. So yes, her friends for her 16th birthday were like, "Yes, you're she's getting the preppy handbook and then she's getting all the alligator stuff. So I I think that also is like kind of proves my point about age does play a big part in how preppy we were in the early '80s,
Kristin Nilsen 8:25
and I forgot about all like just the alligator as an icon on everything, not just your eyesod, right? Which of course I didn't have. I had a parrot on my whatever. What do you call it if it's not your eyesod? The J.C. Penney version with the parrot on it, but yeah, the alligator itself was everywhere, and I'm not sure I put that together. Like, why are we putting alligators on our notebooks? I don't think I understood that.
Michelle Newman 8:49
Well, it was you're right. The alligator coming from the Lacoste shirts, the ISOD shirts became like she said. I love that she has the button that says "Love to eat them, preppies, because the alligator is probably like, hey, I didn't ask to be the symbol of this. I'm going to eat you, but you're right. It did become kind of an official logo symbol of that's preppy has the elegant, the shoelaces, the all of it, the earrings.
Kristin Nilsen 9:15
Yeah, I was not. I was not preppy in that I did not identify as a prep because remember that you would you would use that as a label like are you either as an adjective or a noun are you preppy are you a prep so I was not preppy in that I did not identify as a prep but there is no denying that preppy fashion was my only look the only look for a period of time because that was the dominant mainstream look. There were no alternatives unless you were a burnout or a radical, and I was neither of those things. I was right. I was heavily right in the middle, right? And and there's something about those styles too. Were very they were fun. They were cozy. They were comforting. So it. Wasn't a matter of the lifestyle for me. It was a matter of, of fashion. It was just that it was just the clothes that I was wearing, and now it all makes sense. This has been really fun working on this episode because I've solved a problem in my head because I had a real good girl phase for a while, like a girl next door phase right before I became that person who was like questioning everything conventional, right? And I've always looked back and wondered about that. Like, where did the where did your good girl face come from? And now, duh, it was just the style. It was just the style was good girl style. And because I was in eighth and ninth grade primarily, I was comfortable in that good girl space because I had no offers to be anything but a good girl. I had no opportunities, right? And it was if you look back on it now, it was a time of great conformity. Very few people were were expressing themselves loudly as we would later in the 80 s when things got neon and bright and your hair got crazy, right? That would come later. That was like Apollonia, but I really did love pink and green. Like I, that was a magical combination to me. To me,
Michelle Newman 11:09
it still is. It
Kristin Nilsen 11:10
was magical, and I and I understood this to be a gift of the preppy movement too. I I understood that, and I was grateful for it.
Michelle Newman 11:18
Yeah.
Carolyn Cochrane 11:18
Well, gosh, based on what you guys have shared, I'm going to give you Michelle. If I had to give you a score, and if our listeners had to give you a score, the people that are really into this, you might get like a 70-ish in 60s. Oh,
Kristin Nilsen 11:35
that's pretty good. Hey, you get degrees. That's right.
Carolyn Cochrane 11:39
Kristen, you're maybe down in the 30s or 40s.
Kristin Nilsen 11:44
What? But I looked exactly the same as Michelle. I looked the same. Okay,
Carolyn Cochrane 11:47
hold on. So let me do this really fast. Michelle already answered a lot of these, but after going through all those hundreds of comments, there was a theme in terms of what people wore, and they listed all of their things. Okay. So I want to know if you had it, if you wanted it, or if you didn't care, okay, that makes sense. Okay, okay. We
Michelle Newman 12:06
have to be very, Kristen. We're gonna pledge right now. We're gonna promise. We're gonna be very honest. Oh, because I really don't care if I think about like a 50. Yeah, I mean, I'll be a little. And if I fail, I'll
Kristin Nilsen 12:16
probably be happy. So that I'm not out to win.
Carolyn Cochrane 12:20
We'll try to go through these quickly. Okay, so Bermuda bag-the bags with the different with the wooden handles and no, but
Michelle Newman 12:27
I did want one. I did like it. Yeah, I didn't. I I didn't. I mem I remember thinking it was really cute purse, but I don't. I don't. I don't have a memory of wanting one.
Kristin Nilsen 12:37
I didn't know where to source it. I seriously didn't know where to get it, and so people would show up at school with them, and I admired them, but I didn't know what to do about it. You couldn't. There was no Amazon, right?
Carolyn Cochrane 12:47
Right. No. And depending on your local stores, we had a store called the Lodge in the Cherry Hill Mall that was all preppy stuff. Papa Gallo. That store was Papa Gallo all the time. Yes. In our comments, so that would have been a place. Talbot's before it became like for old ladies was a go-to prep stop along the way. So okay,
Michelle Newman 13:07
so my answer is no. Okay, I didn't personally no, but wanted it half credit.
Carolyn Cochrane 13:11
And then we've got our Lacoste alligator shirts. Yes, and
Kristin Nilsen 13:16
got a parrot. Is that half credit?
Carolyn Cochrane 13:18
I think the parrot counts. I mean, because there were a lot of us who were the wannabes who had you know the J.C. Penney Fox or the Dragon from Sears, so there were everybody other things.
Michelle Newman 13:29
Knock you for like your family's financial situation. Yeah.
Carolyn Cochrane 13:34
Okay, another one you answered already, Michelle. But did you pop your collar on those shirts, Michelle? Did I did
Kristin Nilsen 13:41
I I did, but I felt self conscious about it. It felt I felt like a tryhard, and so but I did. Yeah, I I would play with it when I played preppy a little.
Carolyn Cochrane 13:51
You you didn't want me to think you did, but now I'm thinking you played preppy. Oh
Kristin Nilsen 13:56
no, I absolutely did. Okay, okay, yeah, I absolutely did. Yeah. Okay,
Carolyn Cochrane 13:59
I'm loving that. All righty, fair isle sweaters. You, I know you both had. I should have skipped that. Kristen has one in the school picture. Sure, it's so hot.
Kristin Nilsen 14:07
Yeah, it's fake, of course. It's not like I mean, is Fair Isle just the design or with the? I mean, there's
Carolyn Cochrane 14:13
one in the preppy handbook that they say you should get yours from, but I think that will will give mine for sure from
Michelle Newman 14:20
Sears. Carolyn knows the page number. Also, listeners, I feel the need to point out that right now it's August. It's the dead of it's the dead of summer, and it's Carolyn's in Pennsylvania, which I believe has had like record heat waves. She is recording this in not just a. It's actually really beautiful Fairy Isles sweater. The the the design. I love those colors. It's like red and pink and navy blue and light. Very crappy. And then she has a button. It's not just the sweater. She actually has the buttoned up Oxford underneath it. So yeah. Okay. So our Sperry topsiders,
Carolyn Cochrane 14:51
or in my case, it was Sabago Docksides, or so basically your boat shoes. These were your boat shoes.
Michelle Newman 14:57
I had those in, and. This was a really big deal, like in college. So I had these from like 87 to 90 because I have lots of pictures of me, various things at college, and I'm in my like Eastland top signers.
Carolyn Cochrane 15:11
Well, that's one thing I think we'll we will learn throughout this episode is that this wasn't just a you know flash in the pan kind of esthetic that oh, in the fall of 1986 or 82, this is the look. This lasted an entire decade for a lot of people, and then we'll talk later. Is it even still a thing?
Kristin Nilsen 15:32
I had never heard the word sperry topsiders until I went to Massachusetts and my cousin asked me about my topsiders, and I didn't know what she was saying because mine were probably from Kinney, and I. But I so so I don't know what kind they were. I have no idea. They were just boat shoes.
Carolyn Cochrane 15:47
Okay. Well, we'll give you that. Okay. Maybe half point since they weren't one of the brand names, but that's right.
Kristin Nilsen 15:51
But maybe they even were, and I don't know. Yeah, that's right. You didn't look. I don't know.
Carolyn Cochrane 15:54
That's great point. Argyle socks.
Michelle Newman 15:57
Yes. Oh, yes. And argyle sweaters. I loved everything argyle. I
Kristin Nilsen 16:01
did have argyle socks, and I wore them with something that might be on the list coming later. Okay,
Carolyn Cochrane 16:06
okay, we'll go. So your Bass Weigan penny loafers. Did we have penny? No, I that
Kristin Nilsen 16:13
were I drew the line. I was like, those are fucking ugly, and also they also looked so uncomfortable. They were
Michelle Newman 16:19
they were you got to you had to break them in. They were super uncomfortable. I remember the stiff leather, right? Yeah, but I think they're darling. I would, I'd wear a pair today if I didn't have such a. I really wanted themed up feet,
Carolyn Cochrane 16:32
and I did have the Kinney brand, and not only that, they weren't leather; they were vinyl. Oh no! And when you wore them for a little bit, they like cracked across the top, and not in a good way. Yeah, yeah. So that was a sad day for me. Okay, what about sporto boots? Do you remember the like rain boots that laced up? They kind of might have looked like LB, but they came in colors. We
Michelle Newman 16:54
called them duck boots or
Carolyn Cochrane 16:56
duck boots. Christian
Michelle Newman 16:57
had them. We've had we've heard a whole we've heard a whole story about going with her dad, I think
Kristin Nilsen 17:01
we were. This was at Kinney again. We're at Kinney, and I wanted to try on the duck boots. And my dad was like, "You're not buying those shoes. That's the ugliest thing I've ever seen. And I was like, "No, I really have to have these shoes. And he said, he's laughing at me, like in my face. He's like, "If I made you wear those, you would refuse. But because it's fashionable, you like it. Now the truth is, I really did think it was adorable, and in retrospect, I still think it's adorable.
Michelle Newman 17:27
Love them. Yeah, it's quirky and fun.
Kristin Nilsen 17:29
It's quirky and fun. And he did buy me those boots. I love them. Were
Michelle Newman 17:32
yours the boot ones, or just the like actual shoe, like clog shoes? They were nice, and they were just
Kristin Nilsen 17:37
shoes. Yeah, love them. They're funny. They're funny. I
Michelle Newman 17:40
don't think I had them. I loved them. I remember trying them on. Now, my memory is just so shot that this could have been when I was 13, or it could have been when I was 50. I don't remember, but I remember trying those shoes on and feeling like they were super uncomfortable. Like they had no arch support. They had no, and I just couldn't wear them. That was Marlene. There's no arch support. When I was 13, Marlene was already like, "Well, what about your planner sashiitis? If you wear these shoes, you're gonna get a. I loved them, but I don't. I don't think I owned them. I don't remember. I don't think I.
Carolyn Cochrane 18:15
Okay. Well, Spordo would have been like the brand name, and that was the little duck that would been on there. Okay, then those turtlenecks with the motifs like whales or strawberries.
Kristin Nilsen 18:26
I had whales and I had hearts and I really loved it. I really loved them so
Michelle Newman 18:30
much. I had whales. I had I had the multicolored hearts and again, like my sister's text, matched my shoelace. I had shoelaces. Yes, matchings go with them. Yes,
Kristin Nilsen 18:40
that just screams 13-year-old girl. It right is right in my wheelhouse.
Michelle Newman 18:44
Whales. I'm only remembering whales. I feel like maybe some little rainbows at some point. I may have had rainbow
Kristin Nilsen 18:50
too. That's a lot, Kristen. That was a bad year.
Michelle Newman 18:54
Carolyn, you haven't been chiming in on a few. Oh well. I mean, it's. I mean, we're going to all assume that she had all of the above.
Carolyn Cochrane 19:00
Yes, right. All
Kristin Nilsen 19:00
of the above.
Carolyn Cochrane 19:01
Yeah, I would say except when I didn't, and you'll hear about when I didn't. Oh, yeah.
Michelle Newman 19:06
Okay.
Carolyn Cochrane 19:06
And like, yeah, my penny loafers that were vinyl that you could like clean with Windex or with the crack. Yep, the cracks. Okay, Oxford button downs that were a choice. I had to wear them for my uniform, but oh, a choice. And
Kristin Nilsen 19:19
I had I had a pink one that I just-it felt so rugged and feminine at the same time. It's the perfect combination. It's-it's Kristen essentially. It's rugged and masculine and feminine all at the same time.
Carolyn Cochrane 19:33
Perfection. And I know Michelle, some of our followers who commented did the same thing with their Oxfords with the the ribbon that they the little brew and yes or necklace
Michelle Newman 19:43
a necklace like your little pearl like your little or I had like the necklace or like the little drop heart or the end or the add of whatever
Carolyn Cochrane 19:50
the ad of beads oh yes you didn't move the thing okay and then
Kristin Nilsen 19:54
the necklace that popped out of your turtleneck too yes it came out the top like a little waterfall necklace right. Getting
Carolyn Cochrane 20:00
the right amount of chain, like I think mine were just too small, and they go down and lift it out and say, "Look, ribbon headbands. Did either of you have?
Kristin Nilsen 20:11
Yes, you mean the one that you wove that one?
Carolyn Cochrane 20:13
Well, or you just tied
Michelle Newman 20:15
a ribbon. You just put a ribbon under and tied it in a bow. Oh, you could do that. Or there
Carolyn Cochrane 20:18
were some that just were like were grosgrain ribbons, so they were a headband, but they the whole headband was. I remember having one. You know how
Kristin Nilsen 20:25
you had the ribbon barrettes? I had ribbon headbands where the ribbon would be braided all the way around the headband, and then there'd be a little tail coming off. Yeah,
Carolyn Cochrane 20:33
no, that's not preppy. Sorry, no, that's a little right.
Kristin Nilsen 20:36
That's a little the tail. You're right. Tail makes it a little burnouty. But the but yes, I did do the ribbon where you'd pull the ribbon up and tie a bow on top of your head, and that's what I mean by my good girl phase. And I look at pictures and be like, Kristen, where did this good girl phase come from? But now I understand.
Carolyn Cochrane 20:52
All right, anything from LL Bean? Did you have moccasins or the canvas tote?
Kristin Nilsen 20:57
We had no LL Bean was for old people. Like my dad had the tote. I had Minnetonka moccasins. Okay, but I'm just about to say, yeah, Minnetonka moccasins.
Carolyn Cochrane 21:08
Yeah, not sure Minnetonka are considered preppy, but that's oh, that's a good
Kristin Nilsen 21:12
question. I don't know. Yeah, we'll we'll give it to the audience. Let us know. I
Carolyn Cochrane 21:16
don't remember that being listed. Yeah, did they look
Kristin Nilsen 21:19
the same? Because I can't picture LL Bean ones. No,
Carolyn Cochrane 21:21
I think the LL Bean are like more like driving moccasins. Driving mocks. Driving mocks. Yeah, they didn't have any beads. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Just finishing up quickly. A cable knit like fisherman sweater, like the big kind of creamy. I would wear
Kristin Nilsen 21:36
my dad's sweaters on occasion.
Carolyn Cochrane 21:37
That was fun with the preppy life because there were his button downs
Kristin Nilsen 21:41
too.
Carolyn Cochrane 21:41
Yes, that we could kind of borrow from our parents. My dad had this really cool argyle V neck sweater that I would wear all the time.
Kristin Nilsen 21:50
This is when I started getting in trouble for taking my parents' clothing without asking, and it's funny that it was oftentimes my dad's clothing. And I would I remember hearing like my dad would go into the bedroom, and then I'd hear it being like, "Where's my college sweatshirt? And I would be wearing it, and then the battle would begin, and my parents would be like, "You cannot wear our clothing without asking first. And I would literally go in my parents' closet like it was my own, and just start grabbing stuff and wearing it.
Carolyn Cochrane 22:18
Yes. Okay, so let's talk about this word, this word "prep" and this word "preppy. What does it mean? Where did it start? And I thought, who better to kind of take us through the historical evolution of the word "prep" than our resident historian and kind of our cultural and sartorial expert on all things? That would be our friend Kristen. Is that me?
Kristin Nilsen 22:40
I didn't know that I was any of those things, but I thank you. But I thank you. It's sort of like we're sort of going to take a little journey through, starting with the word, and then through the style itself. So the the preppy esthetic did not come from nowhere. Obviously, it was the calling card of people from not just a particular place, but also a particular station in life, we forget about that sometimes. Like what preppy represented. So the term preppy or prep, like I said before, preppy is the adjective, prep is the noun. She's a total prep. Comes from the phrase preparatory schools. So prep schools were were elite private schools that prepared students for Ivy League colleges, because God forbid you should go anyplace else. Like, would it even count? Would it even count? So, you know, when we're talking about a place and a station, we're talking about East Coast people with money. But ironically, the esthetic itself did not start as a way to show your wealth, at least not overtly. Much of the look was about like very high quality clothing that could withstand the elements, basically, while you're on a sailboat, and then be passed down for generations with a durable but worn look that says, "I sail a lot. Yeah, right. So, in a nutshell, the preppy look is very classic, and it goes all the way back to the turn of the century, like the last turn of the century, the one that we refer to, the 1900 s, basically. Okay, so that's when boarding schools and day schools created their very own sort of understated dress code or uniform. This would be mostly for men, of course, because women don't deserve education. Why would a woman be educated? That makes no sense. But it does eventually translate to women. Okay, so their dress code would be things like an Oxford cloth button-down shirt, khakis, navy blazers, loafers, tweed jackets, rugby shirts, because rugby was good, clean fun for these presters, and for Saturdays in the fall, chunky cable knit sweaters. It was not. It was not ostentatious; it was classic, durable clothing, but it also reflected tradition and privilege. So it's a little complicated, right? Money, but not money, but money, but not money, but money. So then, in the 50s and the 60s, people outside of prep schools started emulating what they were calling the Ivy League style before it was. Preppy it was Ivy League because it was now being promoted by big brands like Brooks Brothers, and in their advertising they showcased the clothing in scenarios that made people attracted not just to the outfits but also to the lifestyles shown in the photos. So now Preppy was about how you lived, not just what you wore, like summer camp and sailing and tennis and things like that.
Michelle Newman 25:24
It's all very tied to money too. It is very tied to money. Yes,
Kristin Nilsen 25:28
like old money. Then came the 1980s. Buckle up, everybody. Okay, it's no accident that the preppy look would get a resurgence in the 1980s because it was all about Reaganomics, baby. Reaganomics. The 70s were over. Hippies weren't cool anymore. You know what was cool? Yuppies and lattes.
Michelle Newman 25:49
Yeah.
Kristin Nilsen 25:49
So this is this is why I thought I wanted to be a stockbroker when I really did not know the definition of stockbroker because 1980s. So in other words, the 80 s were about wealth, possibly as a response to the 70s. Love was out, money was in, and now the polished East Coast look was something people aspired to, even if they couldn't find Nantucket on a map. Yeah, all you had to do was dress like you knew where Nantucket was, and it was easy because malls, because of the mall, at any halfway decent mall across America, you could find a J. Crew store, or go to the Ralph Lauren department at your local department store. LL Bean and Land's End were now in the middle of the country where the land definitely did not end, and and if those stores weren't at your local mall, don't worry; those catalogs were prized possessions, showing you how to pop your collar. Right, boat shoes were mandatory for everyone. I never once stopped to ask why they were called boat shoes and why I would need them if I didn't have a boat. Right, never asked. So in the 1980, s, the the early 1980, s especially, preppy became the most dominant, almost default fashion trend to the point that you may not have even known that the thing that you were wearing had preppy origins, like an oversized button-down or even a farisle sweater. I didn't connect the dots on that. I didn't know I was wearing a preppy icon. Of course, like I said, mine was fake. Or if there isn't even a-I don't know what's a real one. I have no idea. All I know is from J.C. Penney, but the point is that I was just choosing the sweater I liked from the sweaters that were available because that was the style that was everywhere. I mean, to say dominant, dominant is not a big enough word to say what our malls looked like, what the hallways of our schools looked like. Not that there wasn't something different, like we said, we had there were burnouts and radicals, but like somebody had to be dressing differently. But for the mainstream people, that's how mainstream people were dressing.
Carolyn Cochrane 27:50
Yeah, yeah, it was. You could not escape it. It was everywhere we looked. Yeah, just pop culture everywhere. Yeah, I
Michelle Newman 27:58
mean, you say that's how mainstream people were dressing, but it's not just the people we knew or our friends in school. It was all the people we were watching on our movie screens or on our TVs. Right, the prep style truly bled into all forms of the pop culture we were consuming, especially like I said in TV and movie characters, we all aspired to have the closets of right, like Blair Warner and the Facts of Life. Yes, her wardrobe was a masterclass in early '80s prep. Now, of course, she went to a prep school, so she had to wear the blazers and their crisp blouses. But think about it, Joe like wore her collar open and her tie loose, and she had to. But Blair was the epitome of prep school, preppy, the the blazer, the plaid skirt, the crisp blouses buttoned up to the top, perfectly coiffed hair too, played a big part in it, and all of that, like kind of like we just talked about, truly embodied that traditional old money archetype, right? Like how they're looking. I mean, think about Alex P. Keaton. He was the ultimate young conservative preppy. One thing I loved about Alex is that it was such a stark contrast to Elise and Stephen, to these ex hippie parents. Oh yeah, I forgot they were hippies. Kind of, yeah. That's right. Totally, yeah. But Alex, I mean, he was always dressed in like a sharp three piece suit, button-down shirt, neatly knotted ties, just to go to school for high school. Season one, he was still going to high school. Yeah, Alex was symbolizing that whole ambitious, clean-cut, upwardly mobile.
Kristin Nilsen 29:34
That's right,
Michelle Newman 29:34
youth. I mean, he was the yuppie. Yep. What about Muffy B. Tepperman from Square Pegs? One of my favorite characters, such a sadly short-lived show, and you guys, we really need to do an episode. We've talked about it in a lot of episodes, so listeners, if you're like
Kristin Nilsen 29:49
Jamie, Jamie Gertz, Jamie Gertz, Jamie Gertz. But you talk about
Michelle Newman 29:52
adhering to the preppy style. Muffy was consistently seen wearing monogrammed sweaters and. Chris Pastel polo shirts, plaid blazers. She even wore preppy baseball caps, which was a look, right? That was, and then there's movie characters we loved, like I mean, Claire and Andrew in the Breakfast Club, or Alec and Leslie in Saint Almost Fire, Steph and Blaine, Pretty in Pink. Pretty much every character in the movie class, I mean, and again, prep school look, but that's like Kristen just said-that's where it got its origins. And you know, all of us, the three of us, and all of us listening, we poured over the preppy fashion spreads in 17. So many blazers, especially the back-to-school issues in the early 80s. And like you just mentioned, we read catalogs like J. Crew LLB and Lands End and Eddie Bauer, like they were magazines. Yeah, you know we're circling things, we're dog earring things. This style and this whole prep look-it was everywhere. You just couldn't escape it.
Carolyn Cochrane 30:53
The pages of those magazines and those catalogs gave us a glimpse into the preppy look, but the full-on, in-depth view, the instruction manual could only be found on the pages of the official preppy handbook. Okay, the book that arrived in October 1980 and basically said, "Would you like to know how to be rich, waspy, and effortlessly fabulous? The book was the brainchild of Lisa Bernbach. Okay, Lisa was a young journalist and a Brown University graduate, and while she was at Brown, she just noticed there was this look about the people there, and she was fascinated by it. And she noticed that there was like an entire language, and there was an entire like line of clothing and summer places that these people went, and their social behavior. It just seemed to communicate that something was going on without actually specifically saying anything. So she decided to do a little study on this, and along with three friends, Jonathan Roberts, Carol McDee Wallace, and Mason Wiley, they kind of created this almost anthropological field guide to this world of prepdom. There were rules about the clothes and the cars, colleges, cocktails, pets, vacations, decorating, sports, and naturally, what you should name your children. And you guys, that page was dog-eared, like you would not believe. So the handbook famously declared in the beginning that it was the inalienable right of every man, woman, and child to wear khaki. I'm not sure I even knew what the word khaki meant until the preppy handbook came along.
Kristin Nilsen 32:33
Yeah,
Carolyn Cochrane 32:34
and you guys, it was pretty spot on. So even though it was intended to be totally satire and kind of poking fun at this exclusivity and this old money that we've been talking about. It also helped democratize that esthetic, that exclusivity. Like it said, here are the secret signals. Go forth and purchase them. And boy, did we, you guys. Okay, first of all, the book sold more than a million copies, and it became, as we've already said, a cultural phenomenon. Lisa Bernbach suddenly found herself having to explain, and I can't even imagine there was a time when people didn't know what the word prep meant. So she'd be in interviews or on TV talk shows, and she'd have to first explain what the term prep meant, and she became kind of a celebrity herself. We had commenters tell us that they would stand in line at her book events. She often came to college campuses to promote the book, and they would get her to sign the book. They would get their picture taken with her. Somebody still has it framed, and it's like on their bookshelf somewhere. People loved Lisa and what she stood for, and the brands that we mentioned earlier-they they just loved this, and they kind of understood that they could take these codes of prep like Ralph Lauren and LL Bean and Lacoste and J. Crew and turn them into something so much bigger. And this esthetic, as we could tell from this book and all the stuff we've talked about so far, it became aspirational, kind of nostalgic, and eventually it just was American. I mean, it just kind of felt like who we were as a culture and as a country, and that's why this official prepping handbook is so much more interesting than simply a book about clothing. It was so much more, and I'm going to get a little deep with you guys here. I really say it's almost a book about belonging and how to belong. Like, oh, absolutely. This was like just give me the rules. If I know the rules and I'm a rule follower and I follow them, I'm going to belong to this special group. Yeah, and you guys, as we'll hear more, and we've heard already, that's indeed what I did.
Michelle Newman 34:44
It was super aspirational for a lot of us that were younger because I think when you flip through the book and you see that a lot of the illustrations and stuff, and like you know what to name your kids, what to do at parties, what to drink, what to this is you know you said Lisa. Was in college, so these are things that college kids are maybe thinking of or whatever. And then there's those of us that were 11 and 12, seeing all of the things in this book as very aspirational. Yeah, but it was also the money thing too. I mean, aspirational. If I do all these things and follow all these rules, maybe I'll be part of this group, this kind of affluent East Coast type of group. It's a social
Kristin Nilsen 35:27
climbing thing, right? It's a and if you need and if you want to climb the social ladder, here's your handbook,
Carolyn Cochrane 35:34
and here's exactly what you need to do. And to your point, Michelle, like maybe when You're 1112, 13. You don't. You're not as interested in what cocktails I should drink or what should be on my wedding registry. But if you're Carolyn Rich at the time, that and by Rich is
Kristin Nilsen 35:50
her last name. Oh yeah, that's not like Carolyn kind of Rich.
Carolyn Cochrane 35:53
Yes, no. If you were like me at the time, that book was never more than a arm's reach away. So when I did get to high school, or when I was looking at where to go to college and what was going to be my drink in college, you better know I chose the gin and tonic because that was the drink. I didn't even like gin and tonics, people, but that was the drink that was mentioned as being. Yeah, are your
Michelle Newman 36:17
kids' names part of the list?
Carolyn Cochrane 36:19
You know, I kind of matured a little bit. They were, you know, back when you would think about, oh, when I have kids one day, this is what I'm going to name them for 100. Did I not look at that book and see where what names were good? Also, where should I live? Like, okay, these are the suburbs that are the preppiest. I'm going to have to live in one of these suburbs.
Michelle Newman 36:40
I'm gonna have to live in one. I guess that's where I have to live. I guess that's where I have to go to school. I guess my kid's gonna be named, you know.
Carolyn Cochrane 36:48
Because if I followed the rules, and I think my therapist could probably tell you a lot about that about me, but if I followed the rules, then it was gonna work out, and I was going to get to live this this life. Well, you would be
Kristin Nilsen 37:00
long if you followed the rules. You would be long, Carolyn. You would be chosen, and isn't that what everybody wants? Oh my
Carolyn Cochrane 37:07
gosh,
Kristin Nilsen 37:07
that's what. And so I think, and especially as we read through the comments, you'll hear more of that too. You glossed over something that I want to emphasize, and that was the waspy aspect of it. Like this was the Wasp handbook: white Anglo-Saxon Protestant. Like that is 100. It's not where wasp came from. I'm sure, right? That came before, right? Oh, I think
Carolyn Cochrane 37:25
that came before. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But it is it is the
Kristin Nilsen 37:27
Waspy Handbook, and I probably learned that term in that era because of that, right? Yeah,
Carolyn Cochrane 37:35
exactly. I think that I remember when my dad. I think I must have said it, but I didn't really know what it meant. You know that kind of thing because it was in in the book, and then my dad would say, "Do you know what that means? And then, which of course I wasn't Protestant. I probably even thought about changing my religion. Of course, you did. You can't be Catholic. That's so trashy. Catholic is trashy. That's
Kristin Nilsen 37:57
right. But I do remember learning what Protestant was because of that, I learned that I was Protestant. Like I just thought I was Lutheran, but no, we're Protestant, and I was like, oh, so I'm am I waspy?
Carolyn Cochrane 38:10
Well, Kristen, I need to ask you because I don't think I have. Did you own the handbook? Did you? I knew
Kristin Nilsen 38:15
of the book. I knew of it. It might have gotten passed around, so I had a vague familiarity with like the illustrations and the diagrams, but it wasn't my Bible because I thought it was mostly about poking fun at people. It was making fun of Muffy and Biff, right? And that's what I thought the book was. So I didn't dig deep into it, right? And even though I even though I was wearing a rugby shirt and boat shoes, I really did not want to be Muffy and Biff because she was making fun of them. I didn't want to be the people she was making fun of. And they were also Muffy and Biff were like the nemesis of my working class classmates. And I can't, I can't speak for everybody, of course. But from what I remember, Muffy and Biff just didn't apply to us because we didn't have a country club. We we didn't have stuff like that. I barely knew what a country club was. That was like something on Dynasty, maybe. And because and it was really I thought the book was about Muffy and Biff, not about the clothes or the lifestyle. So we didn't we didn't necessarily know we were working class, but we knew we were not them. And the book made it sound like Muffy and Biff were mockable. And I didn't want people making fun of me.
Michelle Newman 39:22
Yeah, I don't think I. I mean, like I told you earlier, my sister had it because I knew, you know, when we talked about or Carolyn for the past six years, when you've been like, we have to do the preppy handbook. I've sort of been like, I've been very ambivalent because I've been like, yeah, the cover looks familiar, but I don't, I don't think I remember. You know, like I said earlier, I was not all like passionate about it, like you were. However, all it took was for me to. Carolyn sent us a link, and and we'll put it in the next issue of the weekly slash monthly reader, where you can. It's like a digitized version, so you can flip through. Because
Kristin Nilsen 40:00
it's out of print, it's long gone.
Michelle Newman 40:02
All oh yeah, super. You can buy it, guys, but it's like you know. I went on eBay
Carolyn Cochrane 40:07
the other day, and yeah, I think this least expensive one was like $80, and they've gone for as many as like 300, $400. So if you've got one on your shelf, people keep it small. But
Michelle Newman 40:20
well, if you got one on your shelf, it's there. You you're gonna keep it. It's there for a reason. Yeah, that's right. But all it took was for me to look at some of these illustrations when I was flipping through it to get whooshger dude right back and go, oh yes, I grabbed my sister's preppy handbook and flipped through it because do you guys remember this one? It says, "Are you a preppy?
Kristin Nilsen 40:39
Yeah,
Michelle Newman 40:39
and there's just a dude standing with his head. That was a
Carolyn Cochrane 40:42
poster, Michelle. Yes, he's actually a poster, right? Yeah, I remember seeing it in places.
Michelle Newman 40:48
But I love, you know, it's got he's all diagrammed out, like you know, he's got a receding hairline, and I remember reading this and thinking it was so funny. Of course, he's got the navy, you know, the navy blazer, the flood level pants, no socks. He has, and his name is Nathaniel Elliot Worthington III. So I loved that one. And then this one was another one that I remember: the basic body types for the male. You have the cute boy, the good old boy, and the as sorry, is it the is it ASP? Yes. How do you say that? Aesthette, like
Kristin Nilsen 41:23
esthetic. It's esthetic. Yeah,
Michelle Newman 41:24
exactly. Because he's got the bow tie and the plaid blazer. Then the female. You have the cute girl, the party hearty girl, and the Amazon. And I do remember
Kristin Nilsen 41:33
Amazon reading the like.
Michelle Newman 41:35
There's the good old boy and the party hearty girl, the Tweedledum and Tweedledee of the preppy set. They may both be quite nice looking, but the space, you know, the the spare tire they carry around their waists make them a different species. Also, everybody understands this is a different time. Different time. This is so heavilyish, and so I don't like it. It makes me uncomfortable now. But we thought it was, we thought these were funny, and like Kristen, you said, you know, she's making fun of Muffy and Biff, and I remember just, just thoroughly enjoy enjoying reading all of these funny descriptions. And then the last one I want to show you that just made my head explode was there was a thing that was called 20 Ways to Express Drunkenness. And again, as like an 11, 1213-year-old, I was like, these are so funny. When I
Carolyn Cochrane 42:19
looked at that list, I thought that's what we would say in college. A lot of those things, or if like if you oh yeah threw up, you were blowing chunks oh yeah yeah and stuff. Which I mean, some of that it said came from there. So I'd like to think even I could talk about throwing up in a preppy way. Like you can't not check your so
Kristin Nilsen 42:36
many boxes, you're gonna so belong.
Carolyn Cochrane 42:39
It's embarrassing. I should have probably prefaced this whole episode with how embarrassing it kind of is, and how I was such a social climber and just wanted to have the things, and it had to be the right thing, not the right. You know, but does that? But
Kristin Nilsen 42:53
it's also good information, Carolyn. Like it allows you to to unearth all of the reasons that you might have been that way, and there's an answer for all of that.
Carolyn Cochrane 43:02
Oh yeah, well I think the belonging thing was has always been so important to me, and those illustrations just that you were talking about before, Michelle, those are so classic. Like I was totally hooser dude when I saw some of those because they're just like you know pencil drawings, and a few of our followers who commented said they colored those in, like they used it as a little coloring book. I mean, this was an interactive experience. This handbook was
Kristin Nilsen 43:31
so funny,
Carolyn Cochrane 43:32
and so I'm so glad that Kristen was wise beyond her years and realized. I was 14. That's right. This was indeed satire, and indeed meant to be a joke, because a lot of us did not see it that way. I mean, we saw like, oh, that's kind of funny, but the rest of it was gospel truth, and we were going to follow that. And so we asked many of our followers. Some, like Kristen, are smart and knew that this was satire, although that did not stop them from following all the rules, sure, yeah. Some of us, we that just went right over our heads. This was like we were getting the in scoop, and we were going to follow everything. I can't tell you how many times I read in the hundreds of comments the word Bible. I think that next to the word crappy were the two that were mentioned, the absolute most, and I will say it again. I felt so seen. Again, maybe this is going to that belonging thing. I'm like, these are my people. They were saying verbatim stuff that I had felt with how they looked at this book, like it was
Kristin Nilsen 44:37
their instruction manual for actual life.
Carolyn Cochrane 44:40
Exactly, and so as I was looking through these comments, that made me feel really good. And also, I was trying to keep track of the answer to a question that Kristen had. She was wondering if this whole preppy thing and the preppy handbook was more prevalent in different parts, or how you
Kristin Nilsen 44:56
viewed it. Like, was it your Bible, or did just did you know about. Its existence, yeah, right.
Carolyn Cochrane 45:01
Okay, and she wanted to know was this predominantly on the East Coast, and I will tell you after my careful assessment and my research skills at work, I can confidently say that this preppy fandom was strong across the entire country. We had people from rural Nebraska to Washington State to Florida to New Mexico to obviously the East Coast Kansas Honestly if I went back through I didn't have the energy to do it I might have counted all 50 states
Kristin Nilsen 45:30
and in addition we had people from Canada and England that made awesome comments I think that's so interesting because I wondered if the reason that Carolyn and I were viewing it differently was because she lived on the East Coast and went to a prep school, and I lived in the middle of the country and lived in a working class area, and but it turns out that it it is literally from everywhere, literate like like she said, almost all 50 states. And I remember having a sort of crisis of conscience when I was the summer after eighth grade. So this is peak prep, okay, and I'm viewing the book as as a comedy, and you don't want to be Muffy and Biff because we're making fun of them. And then I went to visit my cousins on the East Coast who did go to boarding school, and the way they talked about things from the book, they didn't reference the book, but the way they talked like from the book, I got very confused, and I started thinking that maybe the book was for real, that or that that they were, that it wasn't satire. And then I started questioning myself. Like I was just, and so to this day, I was I didn't know until we got confirmation that it's satire. Really, at 58 years old, I was still going. I thought it was satire. I didn't even know it was an instruction manual. I thought it was supposed to be a joke. Well, flip the script. It was a joke. So this whole time, it's been confusing to me.
Carolyn Cochrane 46:50
Right, and yeah, and I think that a lot of the people who responded to our crowdsourcing question-that that's what they kind of felt too. Like satire, is it? Was it? I don't know, but mostly people didn't care. No, this was just what they were going to do. Yeah, and so right now we're going to take this part of the podcast to just share some of the comments that you all shared with us that kind of stuck out in different ways. And first, I want to share with you the comment that probably blew me away the most. Okay, this comment came from Father James Martin. Father James Martin is a very popular Jesuit priest, Catholic priest, and he's become very recognizable because of his progressive views. He's very liberal, and he's kind of a spokesperson for the LGBTQ faction of you know the church, he is again popular. All the people Brock follows him. Brene Brown, you know he's in that realm of people. So when I saw that he had commented on our crowdsourcing about the official preppy handbook, I about fell out of my chair because, okay, we're priests like people before they were priests, and how could this happen?
Kristin Nilsen 48:06
The preppy priest. I can't even say it. The preppy, preppy. The prep still can't do it. Yeah, pop your
Michelle Newman 48:10
pop your white your collar.
Speaker 1 48:12
Yeah, pop your collar takes on your empirical
Kristin Nilsen 48:15
collar,
Carolyn Cochrane 48:16
and I loved his comment because it is so true and it is so reflective of what the whole preppy kind of lifestyle is about. He said at Penn, and this would be at the University of Pennsylvania in the early '80s. Everyone pretended not to read it and to know the contents instinctually, but even if you knew it all, you still read it. So of course you pretended it was beneath you, and you just knew this stuff. But actually, you were there reading all that. That's so telling.
Kristin Nilsen 48:48
That is so very telling. I am a true prep because I don't even know that I'm prep because I don't have to study to be prep. I don't need a book to be prep. I am prep,
Carolyn Cochrane 48:56
right? But hold on, don't
Kristin Nilsen 48:58
look. I'm going to look in this. Right,
Carolyn Cochrane 48:59
exactly, exactly. And I, I just. makes my heart so happy to know that this was Father James Martin that wrote that, and that he felt that way too. That he had these aspirations and this want wanting to be a prep, and that's the first comment that just stuck me struck me, and I thought I have to let you all know about that
Kristin Nilsen 49:21
big. Then here's another one that we need to share because it it explains a lot, it reveals a lot. So many people will identify with it, and we we could probably have a podcast episode on this comment alone. I've condensed it and I've edited, so because it was very long. But I do need to tell you that what I'm part of what I'm not going to share with you is this clever inclusion of all of the chapters. So I just she she she wrote this like a like a short story, and in the in the course of the narrative, she talks about the prep value system, the prep persona, Lily Lacoste, and LL Bean. What else is there here? How to talk to a sales. Debutant to be dress the part. She's not listing, and I. It took me a while to go. Hey, are those chapter titles? So this is Amy. Amy, thanks so much. There'll be lots to talk about here. This is what Amy says. As a young teen, I would fill the time waiting for my mother to finish her shift at the local library by voraciously consuming the official preppy handbook. It was not allowed for borrowing, and I would often hide it in the stacks for my next visit, afraid that it might disappear. Hold on, that would leave me at the mercy of my middle school bullies. Their most cutting insult was to tell me that I dressed poor. In our 1980s Reagan-era upper-middle-class suburb found in the preppy shadow of Cambridge, Massachusetts, this was one of the weightiest insults that could be lobbed. I looked to the preppy handbook as an instruction manual, and along with copies of LL Bean and J. Crew catalogs, I assiduously studied every aspect of every affect. I too wanted to be considered top drawer. I didn't have a preppy nickname, but maybe I could remediate that by selecting a posh-sounding middle name for my Catholic confirmation. It's so cute. I
Carolyn Cochrane 51:05
see you and I feel you. Yes, right.
Kristin Nilsen 51:07
It was not until much later that I realized the preppy handbook was meant ironically. I had utilized it to inform me and ease my way through the awkwardness of adolescence, not realizing that I was using my preppy togs to probably obscure my autism from others and myself. By literally buying into and co-opting a culture that wasn't mine, I allowed myself to become a caricature, expecting my camouflage to cover my social gaffes and protect me. Those truly in the know could easily detect that I didn't summer anywhere, and I eventually realized the only person I was fooling was myself. However, I do still adore my Diane von Furstenberg wrap dress and can be found daily in a tattered Oxford shirt with my less than purebred but fully lovable dogs. Oh, Amy, thank you so much for that. I feel so much. That was yes.
Michelle Newman 51:57
That has to have been super therapeutic for you to write because it sounds like you have come, you know that that was a, it was a really big kind of, you know, deal in your life to be feeling less than right, and so you tried to hurt us to ah, I love to belong
Carolyn Cochrane 52:15
again. Oh, I love
Michelle Newman 52:17
for sure. So Katrina Paveglio, Texas, 1982. I was 12. It was my Bible. Okay, yes, we know that's that's like everybody's nodding. Yes, same, same, same. But she says hilariously, it's still in my stack on my nightstand, but I haven't looked at it in years. That must be a really big TV. Trina, I bet you you have right who's checking
Kristin Nilsen 52:45
in. Yes,
Speaker 3 52:46
yeah. A
Carolyn Cochrane 52:47
common theme that I heard as I read through these comments was that after reading the official preppy handbook, people like our friend Danielle Fillmore and Amy Richardson Brown tried to convince their parents to send them to boarding school, like that was going to be the answer to everything, and both of them unfortunately were unsuccessful as they share in their comments. But that didn't stop Amy Richardson Brown from trying to be as prep as she could, living in Southern California. She was sad they didn't have field hockey at her school, and she hated horses, which meant polo was out. But instead, she played water polo. So hoping that that could kind of count a little bit exactly. But she still has the copy of her book, and she says she slowly morphed into the grandparents section at the end, which I used to always ignore that part. But yes,
Speaker 4 53:38
I totally
Michelle Newman 53:40
remember that. Oh my gosh!
Carolyn Cochrane 53:42
And I'm probably, if I look at it now, would probably tell you I'm three quarters of that. I mean, it's probably like your needle pointing and your, you know. Oh, how to be a preppy grandma? Yeah. Oh, how to be a preppy old person, probably. Okay. And then we got a speak pipe from our dear friend Colleen.
Speaker 3 53:59
Well, the back to school issue of 17 magazine was quite a pivotal publication in the 1980s. My true Bible was the official preppy handbook. 46 years later, I still treasure that dog-eared book. When I googled to confirm the publication date, my heart broke a little when I read the words Lisa Bernbach's satirical humor guide. For me, this was not humor. It was an actual blueprint for my future, and to fulfill my dreams, I began a campaign to convince my parents to send me to boarding school. I just moved from Dallas, Texas, to Beaver Dam, Wisconsin, and it seemed as if no one there had gotten the message about Sperry Topsiders, Fair Isle sweaters, Kelly Green wide glow corduroys, or Baswegian penny loafers. Boarding school would be my escape. I was even willing to attend an all-girls school. I'm looking at you, Miss Porters, but still the answer was no. I reminded my parents that my dad had attended boarding school, and they weren't. My mom said he'd been too immature to head off to college, so his parents sent him for a postgraduate year in New Hampshire. So I pleaded and cried. Apparently, my immaturity wasn't enough to get the yes I dreamed of. Two years later, when we moved to Miami, Florida, it was 1984, and shifting to a Miami Vice vibe seemed to happen overnight. But despite the Reebok high tops and bright Amazon sweaters, the preppy girl lived on in my heart.
Kristin Nilsen 55:27
Oh, she cried. She cried. My parents said she couldn't go to boarding school from Beaver Dam, Wisconsin. It
Carolyn Cochrane 55:36
was it was everything for her, and it still is. We know Colleen, and we, I see you, Colleen, and I feel you, and I'm just jealous you still have your book because that's worth a pretty penny, and I really wish I still had mine. Okay, I wanted to share a comment from our friend Beth Holmes. I recognize the book as satire, but I also took it as something of a how-to manual. She knew that she needed a few of these accessories that we've been talking about, and she worked at a restaurant and knew that she was going to have to save up some money to buy some of this stuff. And the way she calculated all of her purchases was by thinking how many toilets she would have had to scrub to earn a particular item. And she sprang for an aspirational pair of Sperry Topsiders, and she informs us that it was 1000 toilet pair of shoes, but they were so long lasting and versatile. So 1000
Kristin Nilsen 56:31
toilets,
Carolyn Cochrane 56:31
yes, 1000 toilets. But she does pick up on the theme that is throughout the preppy handbook that the items, these clothing items and shoes and all that-they are of high quality, so you might pay a little bit up front, but you're going to have them forever. It's not fast fashion. Yes, exactly. So her 1000 toilet cleanings were worth it to her.
Michelle Newman 56:53
Yeah, she also says something about that she wore a lot of the basic stuff, like the J.C. Penney Oxford button-down. None of this overpriced alligator stuff, which brings me to our friend Amanda McGee's comment about yes, being preppy and loving the book, but saying, "I admit that I might have taken an alligator off one shirt and sewn it on a J.C. Penney poem shirt. I love that. Oh, Amanda, you are so not alone. I bet you got so many listeners right now just going, me too.
Kristin Nilsen 57:25
I would have if I could find an if I could have found an alligator. I didn't even have access to an alligator. If I had found an alligator, I definitely would have very carefully cut it off and put it on over my parrot. How many
Carolyn Cochrane 57:37
listeners were were super clever with this little hack, as we like to call it, you could buy a pair of alligator socks, and they had alligator on both of the cuffs of the socks. You could take that alligator off and sew it on, so you could actually
Kristin Nilsen 57:56
tread. Oh,
Carolyn Cochrane 57:57
yeah!
Kristin Nilsen 57:58
I never thought of that.
Carolyn Cochrane 57:59
That's good, you know. Yeah, some of us had to be pretty clever.
Michelle Newman 58:02
Jennifer Snead says, "Read the book cover to cover and back. She was a poor kid in Oklahoma and says it was definitely aspirational, almost fantasy. We talked about that earlier, right? How aspirational this would be to people. She says it influenced the clothes I looked for at the Goodwill and garage sales tried to fake the true preppy vibe with knockoffs. Can't say it hurt me as aspiring to preppy does set your trajectory higher than it might have been.
Kristin Nilsen 58:29
Using whatever you got.
Carolyn Cochrane 58:30
I was reminded after reading some of the comments about how much stuff there was, like accessories that went along with the preppy handbook. And one of our followers, Bridget B, shared that she still has her original copy. Also, she has the preppy scrapbook and calendar, and that sent me down a rabbit hole. There were all of these desk accessories. There was an address book. There was a bulletin board. There was stationery. There were Christmas cards, and I don't think I sent them, but I do believe I received some of the official Preppy Handbook Christmas cards. The poster that you had, Michelle, was another one of those things. There was there were T-shirts, like a preppy drinking T-shirt. I think it had all the drinks listed on it, and then I did not have this. I don't know how I missed it. There was the official preppy handbook album, like vinyl record of greatest hits. What? And if you remember, or you might not, but in the book it did list some of like the favorite preppy songs that you would maybe listen to, you know, in Nantucket as you're summaring there. And so the track list included some of the some of these songs, the platters with this ring, a few by Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes. I do know that name of that group. So these were kind of
Kristin Nilsen 59:52
they're retro.
Carolyn Cochrane 59:53
Yeah, these are retro even for the time we're talking like probably 60s, like from the 50s and 60s.
Michelle Newman 59:58
Says that they lived by it. Even picked my college because it was listed in it. Carolyn, are you sure that person's name is a Carolyn? I'm
Carolyn Cochrane 1:00:09
really embarrassed to tell you this other thing that I did. So I, as many of our listeners know, I went to Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, and many of the sweatshirts we could get at Trinity, just said Trinity on them. Well, Trinity College in Connecticut is actually in the Premie Handbook. Oh my god! And so if people mentioned to me sometimes like, "Oh, do you go to Trinity? I mean, it wasn't a lie, but they'd be like, "Oh, yeah. Like I didn't. Let's just say I didn't correct people if they assumed it was Trinity College in Connecticut. Yeah, it's bad people. Okay, so just as someone picked their college, I loved reading this from Old French Trading Company. She said, Fall 1980, it was her senior year of high school, and it was her Bible, and she stocked every catalog that she could get her hands on because, as we know, internet shopping was not happening back then. She ordered whatever could be shipped to her, her very small California town. So we're talking things from J. Crew, all of those places, Ralph Lauren, and she or even ordered a duck print turtleneck from the LL Bean catalog. Gotta love those ducks. A little aside: there's a whole page in the Prebby handbook about the duck motif, and I decided my senior of college I was going to collect ducks. I my mom made me a duck pillow, and when I had my first apartment, there were like a brass duck here and there, and yeah, I had ducks that were of the duck motif. So our friend, old French trading company, had a duck turtleneck, and she said that, and I love this, you guys. So she got a boyfriend when she went to college, and she said my new boyfriend was willing putty in my hands, and he let me dress him up in Ralph Lauren polo shirts and oxfords, and so he basically became her little persona. I think she probably used preppy persona too, because I do believe in the handbook that's the college age prep. Yeah, yeah. She wanted
Michelle Newman 1:02:08
him to be like Nathaniel Elliot Worthington,
Carolyn Cochrane 1:02:13
and she made sure his collar was popped and all of that. And I just thought that was hysterical. You had a boyfriend on go along with that. That's cute.
Michelle Newman 1:02:21
Well, Chris Post says that she lived so far from a prep's true habitat. I guess the East Coast, right? She lived in southeastern Idaho amongst the Mormon pioneers, and says that the book was her refuge.
Kristin Nilsen 1:02:37
That's funny. It does seem a theme. We say aspirational, but the other thing that means the same thing as aspirational is get me out of here, get me out of here. Yeah, Riverdam. I don't want to be in a small town in California. I want to be on Nantucket or some place where like people. I don't know. I don't want to. I don't want to label anybody. But people need to get out. Lays
Michelle Newman 1:03:00
Van to a listener a underscore DPH five says I had this book and treasured it, especially as a cornfield surrounded Central Illinois teen, right? But also, I mean, she wants to get out of cornfield surrounded central Illinois. But this is so tragic. I was plunged into teen angst when my mom threw it in the wood stove because it had the word bitchin'
Kristin Nilsen 1:03:23
in the wood stove, no less. Like that's just a little house on the prairie. Did you not
Michelle Newman 1:03:32
from the rocker where she was churning butter? Did you not have another heat
Kristin Nilsen 1:03:37
source? Was that your only heat source? She gathered up
Michelle Newman 1:03:42
her calico skirts and walked over to the wood stove.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:03:47
There is a whole section of the handbook that's at the end, kind of like a glossary of all the lexicon of prepdum. That goodness knows I memorized some of those things, and I believe that is where you could find exactly what bitchin' meant.
Kristin Nilsen 1:04:02
Oh, interesting! So that was a that was a word of the moment, bitchin' Yes, yes. Oh, bitchin'
Carolyn Cochrane 1:04:08
And speaking of lists of things and other helpful hints you got from the preppy handbook, there was a whole section for preppy nicknames, and so we just talked about it before, where somebody didn't have a nickname, but they were going to use their Catholic confirmation name to be something fun and preppy. That
Kristin Nilsen 1:04:25
was Amy. Yeah. Yes.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:04:26
And so our follower Sue's N H J said she wanted to be called called Bitsy after reading all the list of preppy names, and also the classic like number one prep name that's in there is Muffy, and that goes all the way back to our square pegs discussion. Like there was nothing more preppy than Muffy as your quintessential measure. And a follower replied to Sue's and her bitsy comment and said, "My preppy name was Kiki. Give. To me by my friend Skip, and there's a whole section of like acronyms and what those stood for in the preppy handbook, and our follower Sunflower 9261998 said, "My mother and I still say N O K D. And does anyone remember what that meant?
Kristin Nilsen 1:05:21
I have no idea.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:05:22
Not our kind, dear.
Kristin Nilsen 1:05:24
Oh, ouch! Ouch. Okay, so in order to belong, you also have to exclude
Carolyn Cochrane 1:05:29
right. Happy not. Yes. Yes. It is very. It
Michelle Newman 1:05:33
is very class associative, right? Yeah.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:05:38
Sure. So
Michelle Newman 1:05:39
this is from a listener named Adrian Collette and or Carolyn Cochrane, because sorry says the biggest influence was that Volvo 240 wagon. I loved it, and then after I got in a car accident in 1998, my boyfriend, now husband, and I got a white 1984 wagon, and we have never owned another brand of car. Carolyn, you still drive a Volvo, have you always? Yep.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:06:10
Okay, you guys. No, I have not, but I will tell you another. Golly, this is a confessional. Oh my God. Okay, so I can even remember when this happened, Andy had a Honda Accord two door, and it was really a nice car. But one night I was laying in bed and I said, "I think we should trade in the Honda 40 Volvo. And I saw one, Andy. It's a used one at the Volvo dealer, and I've already like gone and checked it out. Somehow I convinced Andy. He still regrets this decision to this day, to get this Volvo, and it was like it wasn't the cute 240 wagon. I think it was a nine something. It was like this big boxy sedan. This is one that had the the CD player in the trunk, so I thought we were really living large, and it had a sunroof. And he agreed to let us do this, and that thing was nothing but problems from. I was so excited to have it, and he let me drive it to work one day, which was school, and in Dublin, Virginia, which is pretty rural Virginia. But I had to get my teacher friends to get in the car with me. I was going to take him for like a spin, like at lunchtime. I know this is so embarrassing, and I put pull down my sun visor because it was kind of sunny, and the mirror thing in the sunlight just fell into my lap, and it was just par for the course for me. Like I just I wanted this stuff so badly that I was willing to just. It's awful. Yeah, to overlook to
Kristin Nilsen 1:07:34
overlook the look in order to have the look. You want the look at any cost,
Michelle Newman 1:07:40
Adrian. It it didn't stop there. She says we, her husband loves them too, and has learned about them inside and out, and out, and fixes them all up. We've owned many, have convinced my mom, my sisters, and our daughters to drive them, and even go to the national and regional Volvo meets and make friends with lots of cool people. She should be the spokesperson.
Kristin Nilsen 1:08:01
Yes, right. Yeah, yeah. Yes, I love it. I
Carolyn Cochrane 1:08:04
see you, Adrian, and I feel you. That is so
Michelle Newman 1:08:06
great. Well, I love that when we get the comments from men, right, and how this was an influence on them. And our listener William Lambert, or our social media follower, hope you're a listener, William, says that the influence on him was massive. He inherited a copy from his older sister, who was already in college at the time in Auburn. Of course, my mother already had me in Lacoste polos and Sperry boat shoes, but the influence of the book to this day is enormous. I still wear go to hell pants and wear madras and white box when seasonally appropriate.
Kristin Nilsen 1:08:39
Wow, William has been living
Michelle Newman 1:08:41
the preppy handbook since the 80s. Yeah,
Carolyn Cochrane 1:08:44
and I think that is exactly when I learned what was seasonally appropriate attire. Yes, exactly. And I loved this comment. I'm going to wrap up our comments with this one because I just thought this is classic. And Ellen, I hope you have a fat wallet because she said my friends and I all had this book and I am giving it back to them for their 60th birthdays this year. I don't know how many friends you have, Ellen, and I don't know where you're going to find them. But like I said, they are worth a penny penny, and those are you're going
Kristin Nilsen 1:09:17
to say, "Can I be your friend?
Carolyn Cochrane 1:09:18
Okay, that too. Yes, Ellen. But I already turned 60. But you can do it for my 61st birthday, which is next year. That's a brilliant idea. I don't have
Michelle Newman 1:09:26
yours.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:09:27
I don't know. I don't ask Carolyn.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:09:30
I had it. I mean, you guys. I referred to it for many a year, like after I was married, when I was like, what I was going to name my kids. Maybe I told you where I was going to live. Yeah. All of that. It it was doggy eared and all the things, but I don't know. I guess after the moves, or at some point, I probably just had a lapse in judgment and thought I'd never. It was silly.
Kristin Nilsen 1:09:52
I've outgrown this now. Yes, I'm a big exactly right.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:09:55
Or I'm our I'm in it. I don't need to know how to do it because I am. No, I
Michelle Newman 1:09:59
live it. Yeah, yeah, I did it. I became
Kristin Nilsen 1:10:01
prep. I am prep. That is right. I'm preppy. I want to read it now. Like I would get so much more out of it now than I would have then. I want to know what those suburbs were. I want to know like all the recommendations. I just want to pick it apart. I find it so interesting. Yes.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:10:17
Well, as we said earlier, we will put a link to where you can flip through it digitally online, and again, if you've got a big fat wallet, you can go on eBay or some used book sites and find it because they're selling for a hot dime. That's a big part.
Kristin Nilsen 1:10:34
It's a big part of people's growing up.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:10:36
So after all that, I have got to ask the question that may be the most important question of all: Is preppy back, or in my book, really honestly, did it ever go away? But if you look around right now on social media and also in my kids' closets, you will see these little pieces of the preppy esthetic everywhere. You've probably heard of the coastal grandmother or a grand millennial, and if you search those and you see that these, it's kind of that old money esthetic, that traditional classic decor and all of that in clothing. TikTok right now seems to have collectively decided that that Ralph Lauren is basically a personality trait. I mean, everything from how to decorate your homes to what clothes to wear. Maggie was all excited to go to the Ralph Lauren store in guess it was Chicago. Yeah, when we ran the marathon, and to go to they have a coffee bar in the Ralph Lauren store, and it's of course all just tweed and plaid and all of that leather stuff. But it was like for Maggie, this was a big deal, and I'm thinking this has been around a while. LL Bean is having a moment. All three of my kids over the last few years have wanted LL Bean boots. They've wanted to know if I had any old stuff that they could have. Oh my God! Maggie has my old Coach purses that she loves, and one of our followers, by the way, who made a comment that she restores Coach purses now? That is her. That's a good second career. So if you've got an old one, or you find an old beat up one at Goodwill or something, you can send it to some of these people who know exactly how to bring them back to life. So Maggie's got my old Coach purses. She gave her bridesmaids. Their bridesmaids' gifts were monogrammed LL Bean totes. That was what. Oh, they got a cute
Kristin Nilsen 1:12:25
gift. Yes,
Carolyn Cochrane 1:12:27
totally. You can like
Michelle Newman 1:12:28
stuff it with cute stuff.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:12:30
Exactly, and I think she did that. And it will last
Kristin Nilsen 1:12:32
a lifetime.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:12:33
Exactly, no throwaway
Kristin Nilsen 1:12:35
gift.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:12:36
Right, and for some of these things, like the tote, the more scuffed up and stuff, the better. So it's almost like as soon as you get it, take it outside and step all over it and make it look like you that you
Michelle Newman 1:12:46
and your and your Wee Gen penny loafers. Yeah. When
Kristin Nilsen 1:12:49
you when we when I talked about my dad's LL Bean tote, when you asked if I had LL Bean, I said no, that's for old people because my dad had an LL Bean tote. He still uses that tote today, and it is beat to hell.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:13:00
That is all the better. Yeah, I mean he is he is living the trend.
Kristin Nilsen 1:13:04
He's living it. Yeah, he doesn't even know. He doesn't even know. He's just carrying around sheet music. Somebody's
Carolyn Cochrane 1:13:09
probably going to come up to him and offer him a pretty penny for that tote because you go online and try to find what a vintage tote goes for. It is a lot, so maybe this whole thing isn't a revival at all. It's just maybe accidentally just you know we've raised the next generation of preps. That's what I'm going to go ahead and think. But it's really a collection of classics of things that last classic, yeah. And maybe we're you know being a little bit more aware of how we spend our money. And I know for the kids, especially Grace, going to resale shops and vintage shops is all the rage for her. So, if you can, you know, find these quality things that are still looking good, she picks them up.
Kristin Nilsen 1:13:49
That's so interesting,
Carolyn Cochrane 1:13:50
so fun. So it kind of brings me back to you, listeners. After we've had this discussion today, I want to ask you: Were you a true prep? Were you just prep adjacent? Were you absolutely positively no way prep? And think about it. We'd love to know what how you identify. And I appreciate you all letting me take this little trip back to the 1980s. My love of this book, Kristen and Michelle, especially for letting me go on and on. I could have gone on and on and on and on, but I do respect your time, and I I thank you.
Kristin Nilsen 1:14:25
She was very restrained. We're so proud of you, Carolyn. You were very restrained and vulnerable, and vulnerable, and honest, and all of that. I think there's a lot being learned today by we're such grownups, aren't we? We're such grownups.
Michelle Newman 1:14:37
Oh, so much. Yeah.
Kristin Nilsen 1:14:37
Needless to say, if you are a Gen Xer, it does not matter where you lived. The official preppy handbook influenced your life in some way. It may have ruled your life and shaped who you were, or who you wanted to be, or it may have just been about the clothes you and everyone you knew were wearing. Whether you thought it was satire or an honest-to-God instruction manual, the look alone was ubiquitous. Inescapable. It was absolutely 100% what the mainstream 1980s looked like, whether you knew it or not. And now we know how that lines up with the wealth-forward culture of the 1980s. It wasn't an accident, and it makes perfect sense. And we have the photos full of Bermuda shorts to prove it. Thank you so much for listening today, and we will see you next time.
Michelle Newman 1:15:23
And to everyone supporting us on Patreon, a huge thank you. Your generosity keeps the lights on and the memories rolling. And because of you, we get to keep revisiting the songs and movies and cultural touchstones that helped raise us. It means more than we can say that you choose to help us keep this conversation alive, we're so grateful. Today, we're giving a special shout out to these patrons. These first four are our newest patrons, you guys. So thank you so much to Barb and Shelly, Amber and Marjorie, and would also like to thank longtime patrons Colleen, Darby, Maria, Melissa, Julie, Jennifer, Pam, Elizabeth, Gail, Nina, Natalie, Lisa, Erica, Stella, Jennifer, Tracy, Mike, Sherry, and Diane.
Kristin Nilsen 1:16:13
Thanks, you guys. Thank you so much.
Carolyn Cochrane 1:16:16
And if you're enjoying the show, we'd love for you to rate and review the podcast wherever you listen, and consider sharing this episode with a friend and help us keep the PCPS Country Club growing. The only membership requirement is a love of Gen X pop culture. So go ahead, give us five stars, tell a friend, and consider yourself officially admitted.
Kristin Nilsen 1:16:38
In the meantime, let's raise our glasses for a toast, courtesy of the cast of Three's company. Two good times,
Michelle Newman 1:16:44
two happy days,
Carolyn Cochrane 1:16:46
to Little House on the Prairie and Chucky and Bitsy and everybody and Big Mister.
Kristin Nilsen 1:16:52
The information, opinions, and comments expressed on the Pop Culture Preservation Society podcast belong solely to Carolyn, the crushologist, and Hello Newman, and are in no way representative of our employers or affiliates. And though we truly believe we are always right, there is always a first time. The PCPS is written, produced, and recorded in Minneapolis, Minnesota, home of the fictional WJM Studios and our beloved Mary Richards. Nanu Nanu, keep on truckin' and may the force be with you.