Bodgies and Widgies drew suspicion and condemnation from an older generation that clung to wartime discipline

The youth subculture took the city by storm post-WWII and sparked a wave of panic for the way they looked and acted.

Were the Bodgies and Widgies as bad as people thought or simply misunderstood?

Before bikie gangs were even imagined, a different kind of menace owned Melbourne’s streets.

In the years following WWII, a generation of disaffected youths began styling their hair, dressing in flashy clothing and engaging in social immoralities that made them reviled and rejected.

They were hunted by police, refused service in shops and even banned from the Royal Melbourne Show for the way they looked and behaved.

They were the culture cult known as Bodgies and Widgies.

But were they as bad as some lawmakers, parents and academics made out? Or was this group of young people, rebelling against the system, simply misunderstood?

Early 1950s news clippings showing the Bodgie style of hair and dress. Pictures: Trove

The mark of a bodgie

Similar to the modern Melbourne hipster, a Bodgie (male) or Widgie (female) could generally be identified by sight alone, and confirmed when engaged in any kind of conversation.

The Bodgies tended to grease their hair into big frontal curls, slicked at the back into a “duck tail” shape.

They wore loud ties, jackets with big lapels, stovepipe pants with reefed cuffs and two-tone shoes.

The Widgies cut their hair short, often wore jeans and short-sleeved tops.

By today’s standards the outfits were utterly conservative but the flair of the Bodgies and Widgies drew suspicion and condemnation from an older generation that still clung to wartime discipline.

Most troublesome was the Bodgies’ and Widgies’ firm irreverence towards authority.

Similar groups in the UK were known as Teddy Boys or Rockers, and in the US they were sometimes called Greasers, a subculture later recalled in the hit musical Grease.

A 1956 news article about Bodgies and Widgies banned from a retail store in Bourke St. Picture: Trove

In Australia, some Bodgies rode motorcycles and many liked fast and flashy cars with brash tail fins and big engines.

The phenomenon started in Sydney, spread to Melbourne, then made it over to Perth where the arrival of the Bodgie pandemic was met with panic.

In 1954 came word that even Soviet Moscow had a Bodgie problem.

Rumours spread of the satanic practices of these wayward youths: sexual intercourse, rock music and even drugs.

Victoria Police was on the lookout for Bodgies and Widgies, who were routinely banned from retail premises and events such as the Royal Melbourne Show, for fear they might wreak havoc.

Meanwhile, reputable Melbourne outfitters ran advertisements reassuring their conservative clientele that “no Bodgie stuff” was stocked in their stores.

In September 1956 Bodgies were even banned from the Royal Melbourne Show. Picture: Trove

Hell with a hairdo

Bodgies were blamed for a string of thefts, bashings, rapes and even murders, and it became standard for news articles about young men involved in accidents or incidents of violence to make it clear whether or not the hubbub was Bodgie-related.

When 19-year-old Harry Burns was fatally shot in Sydney in October 1951, his family made a public statement to clear his name.

“He definitely was not a Bodgie,” his stepfather said.

“Harry is dead now and can’t defend himself. But I and his relatives know how much he would have objected to being termed a Bodgie.”

In one incident, Mr and Mrs Arthur Rose of Pascoe Vale returned home from holiday to find their modest home totally trashed – the work of about 100 partying Bodgies and Widgies.

Their 14-year-old daughter had run off with the gang, resulting in a public plea for her return.

Other Bodgies hauled before a Melbourne court for theft were told by the judge to “forget this Bodgie and Widgie business”, and to “get a job, and stick with it”.

But 23-year-old Milton Mitchell, a proud Bodgie who founded the Australian Jive club that boasted 25,000 other Bodgies and Widgies as members, claimed the derision was totally unfair and the group was simply made up of “modern thinkers”.

“They are only ordinary Australian kids, but they are thinkers in the modern manner.”

Some claimed the Bodgies and Widgies were a natural by-product of adolescence and posed no real threat. Picture: Trove

A love for American dance and clothing styles was the only thing they had in common, he claimed.

Others, including Dr Peter Wiener, an educationist who had worked inside Pentridge Prison, claimed the Bodgies and Widgies were no harm at all.

Still the persecution continued.

In January 1956 one Melbourne Bodgie was given the punishment of a haircut, with a photo of the degrading act published in newspapers.

Ultimately the cultural phenomenon disappeared almost as quickly as it arrived.

As early as 1953 newspapers were asking what had happened to the Widgies in particular, many of whom might have settled down with families.

Once the bane of Australian society, the trend became a fond point of nostalgia as decades passed and the original Bodgies became fewer.

Its spirit was revived when former PM Bob Hawke was nicknamed the Silver Bodgie for his wavy hair and sometimes uncouth demeanour.

But the trend is now recalled as a mostly eccentric chapter in Melbourne law and order; tame compared to the gangsters and crimes of the modern era.