1923 bulletproof vest test - photo

[Frank S]

Bullet resistant or bullet prof clothing can be nothing more than very heavy coat and a women's whale bone coreset. Or as the story my grandmother told about how a 12 ga shotgun blast nearly prevented my dad from existing. She and her boyfriend were planning to elope one night. She had gotten all dressed up in her fanciest dress complete with a whale bone coreset laced up tight and since it was sub zero weather and snowing she had on her bear skin coat made from a grizzly my great grandfather had killed the previous winter. As she was climbing out her bedroom window to walk through the woods to meet my future grandfather. My great grandfather heard a noise coming from outside in back of the house He grabbed his shot gun and went to investigate, seeing what he mistook for a bear trying to get into the house he shot and hit my grandmother his daughter in the side about the location of her left kidney knocking her flat. Upon examining what he thought was a bear he found out he had shot his daughter only she was not badly injured merely a bruised kidney and a couple of cracked ribs,the coat had close to a dozen holes in it from the probably 00 buck shot. her dress was tattered with holes but the whale bones in the coreset had stopped all of the pellets. So relieved that she was still alive he drove her to meet up with her beau. Instead of eloping they were married 3 months later in the church with my great grandfather walking her down the isle My dad was born a little over a year