perfect 36

[Sam Clements]

[ This refers to a baseball player active in the late 1880s, and is from
"the memories of Frank Rutz, published as a series in the The Rochester
Times-Union in December, 1937".
.  Presumably Rutz was speaking in the lingo of 1937 and not 1889, but was
he expanding this expression to cover men, or is there an meaning I haven't
encountered?]

No hits in the newspaperarchive series from 1880-1906.  Then, in 1907, ads
start appearing for "perfect 36" designating a type? quality? of cloth for
women.  ie--"strictly perfect 36-inch quality."

A 1913 cite from the Washington Post describing a man's dress as "anything
BUT a perfect 36."  The guy was disheveled.

In 1914, "perfect 36" was applied to fashion models.  Not sure if their
measurements were involved.

The, in 1918, Mabel Normand stars in a movie "The Perfect 36"['The story of
a boardinghouse Venus'] and it went downhill from there.

SC