https://www.texasworldwar1centennial.org/2018/03/25/texas-wwi-centennial-community-partners-daughters-american-revolution/ Part of a National Effort of the United States World War I Centennial Commission Thu, 23 Aug 2018 12:36:01 +0000 hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=4.9.26 https://www.texasworldwar1centennial.org/2018/03/25/texas-wwi-centennial-community-partners-daughters-american-revolution/#comment-1777 Tue, 03 Apr 2018 19:31:20 +0000 https://www.texasworldwar1centennial.org/?p=30080#comment-1777 Yes, the silk parachute bridal dress were quite common for a short time after WWII because it was one way to get a lot of yards of silk. But during WWII, because silk was difficult to get, they started using nylon for parachutes and switched over. Some of the dresses were made from nylon as well. I don”t think there were any parachute dresses after WWI because parachutes weren”t used that much with fighter planes yet – something about the planes being too small in the cockpit and design issues with parachutes that didn”t get fixed until shortly after WWI. After that is when it started becoming safety wear for pilots. Wiki says the earliest silk parachutes was in the 1790s so maybe there were other parachute gowns pre-WWII. I don”t think they use silk any more: just synthetic fabrics including kevlar of all things. I thought kevlar was heavy but I guess I was wrong. 0

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