For most of the 1800s, menstrual pads were homemade strips of woven fabric or flannel, folded into layers and either pinned to undergarments or held in place with a belt worn around the waist. They looked nothing like modern pads. There were no adhesive strips, no wings, no plastic backing. The earliest versions were essentially rags, and the first commercial products that appeared near the end of the century were bulky rectangles of cotton and gauze clipped to an elastic belt.
Homemade Cloth Pads in the Early 1800s
Throughout most of the 19th century, women in Europe and North America managed menstruation with materials they made at home. The standard option was a piece of woven fabric or flannel, folded into a rectangular strip thick enough to absorb blood. These cloths were washed after use and reused cycle after cycle. The look was simple: a folded rectangle of soft fabric, sometimes stitched along the edges to keep its shape, with no waterproof layer underneath.
Some women used old rags or torn pieces of cotton sheeting, which is where the now-outdated phrase “on the rag” originates. Others cut purpose-made cloths from flannel, which was preferred for its softness and absorbency. These pads had no standardized size or shape. Each woman made her own based on what fabric she had available and what fit comfortably under her clothing.
How Pads Were Held in Place
Without adhesive backing, keeping a pad in position required some kind of external support. The most common solution was a sanitary belt: a strip of elastic webbing worn around the hips with two clips attached, one at the front and one at the back. The cloth pad was tucked or fastened into these clips so it stayed centered. Some women simply pinned the cloth directly to their undergarments with safety pins, though this was less secure.
The belt system persisted far longer than most people realize. Sanitary belts remained the primary attachment method well into the 1970s, only falling out of use when pads with adhesive strips became widely available. In the 1800s, the belts were sometimes called “shaped towel suspenders,” a term used by British manufacturers. They were discreet enough to wear under a long skirt or petticoat, though they were stiff, sometimes uncomfortable, and prone to shifting.
The First Commercial Pads
The late 1800s brought the first attempts at mass-produced menstrual products, though they looked crude by today’s standards. French nurses discovered that wood pulp bandages, originally used to dress wounds, were highly absorbent and cheap enough to throw away after a single use. This was a breakthrough concept: a pad you didn’t have to wash.
British manufacturer Southalls began advertising commercially produced “sanitary towels” in the 1880s and 1890s. These pads were rectangular, made from cotton waste material called shoddy (a recycled textile fiber originally used for cleaning horse tack and polishing brass). The company treated the pads with boric acid as an antiseptic. Advertisements described them as soft, elastic, and lightweight, “in striking contrast to the ordinary diaper, which is cumbrous, heavy, and hot, chafing the skin during its use.” An 1894 Southalls ad called them “the greatest invention of the century for Woman’s Comfort.”
In 1896, Johnson & Johnson released Lister’s Towels, also marketed as “Sanitary Napkins for Ladies,” likely the first disposable pads sold in the United States. They were made of cotton and gauze and still required a sanitary belt for attachment. Visually, they resembled a thick, rectangular bandage pad, not the contoured shapes we see today.
Why Commercial Pads Were Slow to Catch On
Despite being a genuine improvement over homemade rags, the first commercial pads were a financial failure. The reason was almost entirely social. Menstruation was deeply taboo in the 19th century, and that stigma was reinforced at every level of society. An 1811 medical textbook, “The Principles of Midwifery” by Dr. John Burns, described menstruation as something “to be considered a disease.” When the medical establishment itself treated periods as pathological, women had little reason to feel comfortable buying menstrual products in public.
Manufacturers couldn’t easily advertise their products, and women were reluctant to be seen purchasing them. Buying a box of sanitary towels meant approaching a shopkeeper (almost always male) and asking for a product associated with something society told women to hide. Many women simply continued making their own pads at home, where no one would know.
What Using a Pad Actually Felt Like
By modern standards, every pad available in the 1800s was uncomfortable. Homemade cloth pads were thick and bulky because they needed multiple layers of fabric to be absorbent enough. Once wet, they became heavy and could chafe the skin. There was no moisture-wicking layer to pull fluid away from the body, so the surface stayed damp.
The commercial pads introduced late in the century were an improvement in absorbency, but they were still rigid and rectangular. They had no contoured shape to fit the body’s curves, no flexibility, and no way to stay in place without a belt or pins. Women wearing these pads under the long, layered skirts typical of the era had some advantage in concealment, but the physical sensation was far from the thin, form-fitting pads available today.
Washing reusable pads added another layer of difficulty. The cloths had to be soaked, scrubbed, and dried, all while keeping them out of sight from other household members. In homes without private laundry space, this meant hiding wet cloths in bedrooms or washing them late at night. The labor involved in maintaining reusable menstrual cloths was a routine, invisible part of women’s domestic work throughout the century.