| This week in Australia we are celebrating the birth | | | | great as the noise from the nuclear blast and |
| of all those little, itsy, bitsy, pieces of swimsuits | | | | even to this day, the moral outcry is still often |
| called a bikini. If you have ever thought it a | | | | heard. |
| strange name for such a flimsy bit of wishful | | | | Today's bikini is much, much briefer than it was |
| thinking, you may be interested in knowing where | | | | originally. When the bikini was first paraded onto a |
| and how it originated. | | | | Gold Coast beach at Surfers Paradise in 1952, the |
| The Australian lifestyle has always been about the | | | | beach inspectors removed the model off the |
| great outdoors, sun, surf, sand, swimming and | | | | beach for indecent exposure. So she came back |
| anything remotely sporty. When it came to | | | | again the next day with another six models all |
| designing clothes to suit the Australian lifestyle, | | | | wearing Bikinis and this went on for days and |
| designing a suitably attractive swimsuit was top of | | | | days with more and more models, then the |
| the agenda. | | | | women in the general public started wearing |
| Prior to 1952, Australia had every kind of | | | | bikinis, so they were slowly, slowly accepted. I |
| neck-to-knee cover all and it had nothing to do | | | | think the beach inspectors probably got tired of |
| with sun protection. So in 1952 when a fashion | | | | asking women to remove themselves off the |
| designer by the name of Laura Stafford designed | | | | beach for indecent exposure and being howled |
| the first bikini swimsuit for her fashion parade at | | | | down by the appreciative menfolk. |
| the Sands Resort on Queensland's Gold Coast, it | | | | I think what finally gave the seal of approval to |
| caused a massive eruption of public opinion, | | | | the Bikini was the Gold Coast City Council when |
| personal appreciation and furore such as that | | | | they installed "Meter Maids" all dressed in scanty |
| currently being generated from the Nuclear | | | | bikinis' and going around town putting coins into |
| testing being carried out on the Pikinni Atoll in the | | | | expired parking meters. It became the "in-thing" |
| Marshall Islands by the United States. | | | | for males to have their photo taken with a |
| Piki meant "surface" and "ini" meant coconut to | | | | gorgeous meter maid and no woman could say |
| the indigenous Marshall Islanders but it has always | | | | she had been holidaying at the Gold Coast if she |
| been pronounced Bikini and is a very small island | | | | went home without buying a bikini. |
| located in the Marshall Island group of the south | | | | So the bikini got its name from an adventurous |
| pacific. | | | | and brave little woman fashion designer tired of |
| In 1952, the US was still carrying out their Nuclear | | | | wearing swimsuits designed by a man. She knew |
| testing and making huge waves around the world | | | | the bang it would make on society would be as |
| from a little bit of an Island, so Laura Stafford | | | | big as the little Island undergoing nuclear testing in |
| thought it to be the most appropriate name for | | | | the South Pacific; but what she probably would |
| her newly designed little bit of a swimsuit. She | | | | not have known is that today it is a multi-billion |
| thought the moral outcry would be nearly as | | | | dollar business. |