“Form-Fit” sanitary apron (1915).
If millions of women still lack menstrual products today, before, they all resorted to homemade solutions to stop menstruation, which was considered dirty or even dangerous during antiquity.
The long-standing stigma, which still survives today, served for years as a ‘buffer’ to halt the evolution and study of methods of managing menstrual flow.
The ancient Egyptians used softened papyrus as their method of choice, the Greeks turned to natural sponges, while some Native American communities used buffalo skin. In Europe, and among American settlers, the most common were cloths, recalls .
Only in the century. In the 19th century, with the reduction in birth rates, the search for more effective menstrual products took off. In the 1850s, the “sanitary aprons”with rubber bars and layers of fabric to prevent stains on clothes. Later, they evolved into the sanitary beltwith loops to hold absorbent cloths, which were rolled up between the legs up to the navel, connecting to a belt at the waist. They were difficult, uncomfortable and not at all discreet.
Later, Johnson & Johnson introduced the first disposable sanitary belt pads in 1896, known as “Lister’s Towels”, which would completely fail on the market. Why? The shame factor prevented women from adopting the product, which publicly revealed that they were menstruating.
First World War and the first dressings
A turning point in this failure to innovate occurred during the First World War. Nurses discovered that cellulose bandages used in hospitals also effectively absorbed other types of blood, giving rise to the first commercially successful menstrual pad: Kotex Sanitary Napkinslaunched in 1918 by the Kimberly-Clark Corporation. Disposable products were not common, but little by little they began to appear in everyday life.
The success of Kotex encouraged Johnson & Johnson to try again to penetrate the market. In 1927, they hired psychologist Lilian Galbraith to study women’s needs. Galbraith criticized the bulky pads of the past and concluded that women actually wanted products that allowed them to live as if they were not menstruating.
It was this conclusion that gave birth to smaller and more discreet products, and even strategies to reduce embarrassment when purchasing: the bandages were delivered wrapped in newspapers or magazines.
In 1931, Earle Hass patented the first internal tampon with a disposable applicator, allowing self-insertion. Three years later, Gertrude Tendrich acquired the patent and launched the brand Tampax. In 1937, actress and entrepreneur Leona Chalmers patented the first rubber menstrual cup. But domestic products faced cultural barriers: virginity was highly valued, and tampon use was viewed with suspicionfor fear, for example, of breaking the hymen.
World War II and the acceptance of tampons
The Second World War brought the necessary change in attitude, recalls Popular Science. With men at the front, women maintained industrial production, and tampons became more accepted as they allowed uninterrupted mobility, discretion and were often more comfortable. The market started to change.
In 1957, African-American inventor Mary Kenner patented an adjustable sanitary belt with a waterproof pocket, designed decades earlier but only commercialized in the 1960s due to institutional racism. The innovation quickly lost relevance when, in 1969, the brand Stayfree introduced the first self-adhesive pads, making sanitary belts obsolete.
In the 1970s, feminism opened the door to more open advertising and the improvement of menstrual products, from pads with flaps to mini and maxi versions, for different flows. Tampons have faced problems with cases of , but have survived.
In 2002, Su Hardy reinvented the menstrual cup, creating the Mooncup de silicone — lighter, more comfortable and sustainable.
