The rosy-red prom dress was plucked off a rack at the upscale Mademoiselle Shoppe in East Chicago, Indiana.
The cost was $79.99, a pretty penny back in 1959 for teenage girls who may never wear a prom dress again.
“That's where everybody shopped for dresses in the 1950s and 1960s. Back then, only one-of-a-kind prom dresses were allowed at the high schools in the area,” Dianne Pinkowski recalled. "If you were going to the same prom as I was going, that shop would not sell you the same kind of dress."
Back then, she went by the name of Dianne Zawislak, a Northwest Indiana girl who needed the dress to attend her junior prom at Bishop Noll in Hammond, Indiana.
Back then, the Mademoiselle Shoppe was well known for offering stylish and expensive wedding gowns, among other high-end merchandise since its doors first opened in 1938.
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The second floor had a little café where customers could take a break from shopping to enjoy fresh iced tea, tasty club sandwiches and gossipy whispers about other patrons.
For many years, The Times newspaper ran ads stating, “The most beautiful brides come from the French Room," a lushly appointed showroom with a pristine thick white carpet, ersatz French provincial furniture and mirrors seemingly everywhere, according to a Times story.
On May 22, 1959, Pinkowski proudly wore the red prom dress as she strolled into her high school gym. Unlike other girls’ prom dresses that withered away in a dark closet, her dress was just beginning to blossom.
Pinkowski wore it again later that year to her boyfriend’s homecoming dance at Lew Wallace High School in Gary, Indiana, and also to a debutante ball. The next year, on April 29, she donned it again for her same boyfriend’s senior prom at the Chrystal Ballroom inside Hotel Gary, the same venue where The Jackson 5 would perform five years later for another memorable prom.
"There were a lot of formal affairs back then," Pinkowski said. "And a lot of dances."
Once upon a time, she and her boyfriend, Alan Pinkowski, were high school sweethearts. They've been together ever since. Next week they will celebrate their 62nd wedding anniversary.
That prom dress waited patiently in the closet of Dianne’s family as the years peeled away. As a musical poet once, life is what happens when we’re busy making other plans. The dress witnessed many moves through the years, from home to home, closet to closet, memory to memory.
In 1976, the dress finally found a permanent home in the house built by the Pinkowskis. Ten years later, their oldest daughter, Lisa, unwrapped the dress to wear it for her senior homecoming dance at Chesterton High School. Then it returned again to the closet to patiently wait for another chance to turn more heads and make new memories.
Fast forward to 2018, when the couple’s other daughter, Patti, unearthed the dress to show her oldest daughter, Arianna Simms. It was being displayed on an old-fashioned dress form to keep it as pristine as possible.
As the 10-year-old girl put it on, she promised she would someday wear it to her high school junior prom.
“She was adamant,” her mother, Patti Simms, recalled.
Arianna, who's now 17, remembers first spotting the dress in the back of a room.
“I immediately fell in love,” she said. “I loved the shape of it, the color and especially the roses.”
Those roses never withered. Their fashionable bloom is still there.
On Saturday, Arianna attended her first junior prom at Chesterton High School. Her parents and grandparents waited in Simms' home as she put on the dress and its fancy accessories. Outside the home, they posed for photos with her as they waited for her boyfriend to arrive.
“It feels amazing to finally wear this," Arianna said before leaving her home for more photo shoots, then the school, and then the prom. "It feels like a dream after waiting so long."
Her grandmother quietly watched on as the girl looked at herself in the old dress. Pinkowski assured her that the dress, which needed only minor alterations, is still in fine condition even 65 years later.
“I hope it can last another 65 years for my great-great-granddaughter,” Pinkowski said.
"I hope so too," Arianna said with a smile.
Contact Jerry at Jerry.Davich@nwi.com. Find him on Facebook and other socials. Opinions are those of the writer.