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Back In Diapers At 5


Don Davis

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Early in 1998 Angela told her DPF readers about this period of my life I had forgotten from 1944 until I started telling Angela about it a few weeks previously. This is the first time I have ever writen about it. Here we go, to when I was put back in diapers:

My life up to the summer of 1937 had been absolutely marvelous. My family loved me. Dad was a professor of chest surgery at Collumbia Med School in New York City. Mom published medical journals and text books. Granny (mom's mom) was a wealthy delightfully eccentric widow who owned a town house accross the street from our building where we had a masive loft, before they were fashionable. I don't remember before I was toilet trained. My first clear memory was when I was 30mo and going to toddler school every morning where over half the kids were still being changed right there in the big room. Granny would come over to see me in the afternoons. Usually my nanny walked me home from the school a couple of blocks away, sometimes Granny would meet me instead and take me on what she called "Adventures" that were always fun. The nannies changed every few months. The nanny, Granny, my folks and Uncle Hal read to me a lot, so shortly after I turned 4 in June 1936 I surprised Granny by reading a book back to her. By then I was in pre-school that was fun and lasted until 2PM. Although I was a year too young, I was skipped into Kindergarten when school restarted in September. A scout for a radio show saw me reading to a class. Next thing I was a child actor in Network radio shows. CBS and Mutual were next to each other, near Radio City, NBC was both the Red and Blue networks. Granny was the one who went with me ecause she enjoyed being with people like Orson Wells who hired me most weeks. In January 1937 I was transferred to Professional Children's School which had a flexible schedule so child performers could work. To me spending time on the 8TH floor of 30 Rock was like the biggest toy box in the world.

In May 1937, just before I turned 5, Granny took me to meet an advertising agency producing a short movie. That was the first introduction of the revolutionary Platex Stretchy Baby Pants. I got the speaking part of the older brother. I was told the reason I was hired was that I never had complained at radio studios when Granny would put me in a diaper and old fashioned gum rubber pants so if I needed to pee, it would not disrupt the live broadcast. Kids who wanted to work as performers just had to get used to those "Just in Case" cloth diapers and rubber pants under shorts.

As I remember the Playtex film several actresses playing moms are talking in a park each with a baby buggy and infant. There were also an older boy and a girl playing brother and sister of one baby. I was the big brother of the principal baby girl. After the women talked for a minute or so about the future and modern times, the actress (Agnes Moorhead) playing my mom says she will show them a new invention that will revolutionise family life. As we all watch, she fold down the canopy of her baby carriage so it is a changing table. She brings out my baby "sister" wrapped in a blanket, puts her on the changing table and unwrapps her, handing the blanket to all the women who are amazed it was dry. Up to then the camera was blacked by "Mom" to hide "Sister" even as it is obvious Mom is changing her diaper. Only after the change is finished does the camera move enough the audience sees Mom finishing the change by lovingly pulling up a Platex Stretchy Pant.

There were cuts to show reaction by the other moms as well as indifference by the other kids. I got a close up smilling at Sister. Mom has started extolling the magic of the Playtex Baby Pants, saying they are more effective stopping leaks, so much better than letting babies sleep in an uncovered diaper. A mom says her own mother never even used rubber pants. The mom of the older kids mentions that the rubber pants she bought for special occasions had not worked the previous night, when we see the embarrassed look on the face of the girl, who was taller than me. Her brother tries to turn so nobody can see his face. Meanwhile Agnes has put sister back in the carriage so she can display the classic Playtex cardboard tube, saying they will be in all stores soon. Just as Agnes finishes her pitch, the girl says she is leaking and needs a toilet. The camera tilts down to show she is in a puddle, then tilts up to show her mom lifting the skirt revealing old rubber pants that had split, showing some diaper in the crotch. Next the boy says he also needs to go to a toilet. His frantic mom asks "What can I do? I can't be in two places at once!" Another mom leads the boy out of the shot, while her mom leads the girl off camera the other way. That leaves Agnes and the remaining mom to watch 2 carriages.

"Remaining Mom" asks why "Little Donny" has not asked to go to a toilet. My line was "I don't have to" as Agnes shows another secret. She beckons me over to her side so she can un button my shorts, lowering them to reveal my diaper was thin and snug in side Platex Baby Pants. She replaces my short as we cuddle. The last shot is a medium close up of me with Agnes behind me as I say, "Mommy I love my new Playtex big boy pants!" Fade out, fade in to a full frame pring ad layout, with a "Voice of God" Narrator (Orson Wells) telling buyers for stores to be sure to talk to their Platex representative to reserve enough Baby Pants units and receive free ad matts or electrotypes. Trust me, when Orson Wells pronounces Playtex and electrotype, even I wanted them. His last VO says "Platex is just the latest advance of Internation Latex Worldwide as the ILW logo disolves in and the music swells until final fade out.

Later Playtex edited a 2minute 30 second version that did not talk about electrotypes which was a pioneer movie theater commercial that was shown in a few MidWest locations. Since the film was made just for sales meetings, none of the kids I knew saw it, except for the boy and girl who also were at my school. Trust me, although almost all the other performer students were diapered while working, we did not talk about it and none of the three of us ever blew the secret. It was Susan Manchester who played Sister and was in real life a month older than me. She lived in the apartment building just west of our loft and we eventually dated when we were 14, and never talked about Platex. Another really good friend, Terry Edger, played the brother. The was a year older and getting tall. No child actor in NYC then could blush on cue like Terry, With his red hair he was in the original Broadway cast of "Life With Father."

In 1940 Agnes Moorhead played the mom of young Charles Foster Kane in a movie written by, produced by, directed by and starring Orson Wells as "Citizen Kane." Despite the attempts of WR Hearst to burn all prints and negatives of Citizen Kane, the movie lives on. Alas, back in 1997 when I remembered this, I asked ILW if they had the Playtex sales film. Apparently all copies are long gone. Maybe that is just as well, since I am "Daddy Don" and not "Little Donny" now.

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Hi Don. I had heard that children "back in the day" wore diapers until a later age. It's good to have someone who was actually a part of it posting about it. I bet you made a cute "little Donnie".

Thanks again for posting this.

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Hi Robe,

Granny always said I was cute in the Playtex film. At one time I had some publicity stills from it, Agnes, Orson and me in one of them and the random baby girl, Agnes and me in another. Like so many of the phots from the era, they got lost.

I have no memory of being changed by my mother, although Granny said she did her share when my nurse was off duty in the evenings, or by any of the nurses. At the radio studios it was always Granny who diaperd me. That made shooting the film exceptional. Because it was a union rules production, and our diapers were to be shown, a union costumer had to not only change us into diapers, she stood-by while a home economist from Playtex pull on the Baby Pants, then she resumed dressing us in the rest of our costumes, which appeared to be ordinary clothing. Rule was they had to be ranted from a costume company. However, there was no rule against Granny removing my wet diaper the time I just could not hold out until a scheduled break. Go figure.

Hi Don. I had heard that children "back in the day" wore diapers until a later age. It's good to have someone who was actually a part of it posting about it. I bet you made a cute "little Donnie".

Thanks again for posting this.

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