Stand up for the facts!

Our only agenda is to publish the truth so you can be an informed participant in democracy.
We need your help.

More Info

I would like to contribute

$
Viral image
Viral image
stated on June 6, 2019 in a Facebook post:

“In 1921, early suffragettes often donned a bathing suit and ate pizza in large groups to annoy men…it was a custom at the time.”

False
By Ciara O'Rourke
June 7, 2019

No, early suffragettes didn’t eat pizza in bathing suits to annoy men

Womenfolk can be so darn irksome, harping about voting rights and whining about equal pay and slamming some ‘za to provoke the guys. Or so claims a recent Facebook post featuring a black-and-white photo of women eating.

“In 1921,” reads the June 6 post, “early suffragettes often donned a bathing suit and ate pizza in large groups to annoy men…it was a custom at the time.”

This post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.) That’s because the photo is from 1921, but it shows a pie eating contest in Washington D.C., not a savory act of protest.

You can find the photo on the Library of Congress website under the title, “pie eating contest, Bathing Beach, [7/21/31].” The photo was created on July 31, 1921, and was provided by the National Photo Company Collection, which “documents virtually all aspects of Washington, D.C., life,” according to the Library of Congress.

A clearer version of the photo appears on Shorpy, a “historic American photo archive” website that sells prints. That site also states that the photo was taken on July 31 that year during a pie eating contest at Tidal Basin Bathing Beach.

We couldn’t find any credible reports of suffragettes eating pizza to annoy men — though the claim has appeared on Twitter, Reddit and Pinterest, among other websites — and definitely not in 1921. By then, women had secured voting rights. The 19th Amendment, which guaranteed all American women could cast a ballot, was ratified in 1920.

We rate this Facebook post as False.

 
Our Sources

Facebook post, June 6, 2019

Library of Congress, Pie eating contest, Bathing Beach, [7/31/21], visited June 7, 2019

Shorpy, "Pie eaters: 1921," June 8, 2011

HuffPost, "Vintage photo shows teenagers eating pie at the beach in 1921," March 30, 2013

The 19th Amendment, ratified Aug. 18, 1920

Browse the Truth-O-Meter

More by Ciara O'Rourke
Viral image
stated on April 2, 2025 in a Facebook post:
“White hats to investigate Wisconsin Supreme Court election.”
False
Facebook posts
stated on March 28, 2025 in a Facebook post:
Photo shows a missing police officer in “extreme danger.”
Pants on Fire!
Facebook posts
stated on March 28, 2025 in a Facebook post:
Images show damage from an “earthquake in Thailand.”
False

No, early suffragettes didn’t eat pizza in bathing suits to annoy men

Jon Ossoff
stated on June 27, 2026 in a campaign speech:









Donald Trump
stated on June 23, 2026 in a speech in Macungie, Pennsylvania:

David Jolly
stated on June 11, 2026 in a speech:

Marsha Blackburn
stated on June 19, 2026 in an X post:





Steve Robinson
stated on June 5, 2026 in Fox News “The Ingraham Angle”:

Josh Hokit
stated on June 14, 2026 in a UFC event at the White House:


Donald Trump
stated on May 22, 2026 in remarks in Suffern, New York: