Decline of the Hat

[RedPop4]

1) I just finished reading 'Hatless Jack' and will pass it on to the first Lounger who contacts me (by private message), free of charge and postage paid, on the condition that he/she does the same upon reading the book. It's a decent read, although a bit long-winded at times. I thought of contacting the author and suggesting he visit the Lounge, but haven't gotten around to that yet.
2) I believe some of the traffic experienced by Meyer the Hatter is people replacing hats lost in the flood. A lot of black social aid and pleasure clubs incorporate hats into their regalia.
3) Spiridon-Nice hat in the avatar-what is it?

Hey Byrne, how are you?
We'll have to meet sometime.

 

[ledsled]

As prescribed...

I think of those floppy cloth hats as medical supplies,
not clothing.

Yes! I could not agree more. I do not recall what websites market their hats as being recommended by doctors, etc., but they always show those crappy floppy-brimmed hats. Why not show some classy stylish hats? Perhaps some of "our" favorite hat websites mention the medical benefits of wearing a hat, but if they do, it is not memorable (to me at least).

As another regular poster predicted, the decline of our protective ozone layer should increase the popularity of wearing hats, but not much human behavior is following logic these days, so who knows...

 

[Byrne Sherwood]

Hey Byrne, how are you?
We'll have to meet sometime.

I am well despite the heat that leaves me feeling as uncomfortable as Pappy O'Daniel looks in your avatar. I have a hectic August ahead of me, but drop me a PM sometime.

 

[RedPop4]

I am well despite the heat that leaves me feeling as uncomfortable as Pappy O'Daniel looks in your avatar. I have a hectic August ahead of me, but drop me a PM sometime.

"We need a shot inna arm!.....Hear me, boys? Inna g*dd*mn
ARM!"lol lol

One of my hat wearing buddies is coming in this weekend. We're going to Dos Jefes on Saturday night to have a cigar. Spiridon MIGHT be in town, too, although he doesn't usually stay that late in New Orleans since he as to drive back to Mobile, usually.

 

[Renderking Fisk]

I’ve said these things before, but they’re worth saying again…

Around here, I was the only guy driving around in a VW New Beatle and wearing a fedora. Now, everyday I see someone else wearing a wide brim and tall crown fedora driving in some other retro-esque vehicle. I’ve also seen more and more genuine classic/vintage cars on the road.

Is that due to my actions? Am I responsible? Am I a trend-setter? Maybe.

Could it be that there are more people who are gravitating towards Retor-Centric things because the future now seems less and less sure and certain? I’ll wager that’s probobly it – when the here and now seems less secure, it’s only human nature to resort to nostalga.

I also think more people wearing fedoras have to do with sites like COW, The Fedora Chronicles and this one, because the people here on both sides of the political isle can no longer stand or tolorate the modern “fashion” (pronounced “facism”) that’s being perpetuated by the media and classless celeberties.

Why did the fedora lose favor with the general public back in the second half of The 20th Century? Because it was too “Early 20th Century.”

… Why are fedora’s making a comeback now? For exactly the same reason: they’re too “early 20th Century.”

 

[Aaron Hats]

As another regular poster predicted, the decline of our protective ozone layer should increase the popularity of wearing hats,

IMHO, the danger of skin cancer will be the number one reason hats become more common in the coming years. Since we are located in a tourist destination known for its outdoor activities, I frequently see the damage the sun has done to people. I have seen tips of noses and ears removed as well as large patches of skin.

Today, you have companies like Tilley Endurables, Sunday Afternoons and Physican Endorsed making hats with certified UV protection. That will only continue and you will see these hats become more stylish and more commonplace in todays society.

Do yourself and your loved ones a favor and wear a hat. It doesn't matter who you buy it from just buy a few hats and make it as much a habit as putting on your shoes.

 

[Byrne Sherwood]

One of my hat wearing buddies is coming in this weekend. We're going to Dos Jefes on Saturday night to have a cigar. Spiridon MIGHT be in town, too, although he doesn't usually stay that late in New Orleans since he as to drive back to Mobile, usually.

Would like to join you, but I am facing the state bar exam on Monday, so I will have my nose in the books all weekend. Drink an Abita for me!

 

[Widebrim]

I recently saw the movie The Little Fugitive, from 1953. It was a low budget independent movie - shot in Brooklyn, using real crowds and street scenes. The hat era was very clearly over by then.

Joel

I'll revive this thread with a comment on the above. It seems true that if a movie from the '50s/early '60s has real crowd scenes, one will see more hatless men than in those scenes which are staged with actors (although this is more so during summer scenes). It appears that wardrobe specialists were not always up-to-date with fashion, at least when it came to hats. But as Tony in Tarzana noted, the decline of men's hats depended on where one lived. In Los Angeles, hats went out of style earlier than in NYC or Chicago (although I think L.A. Confidential went overboard with the lack of lids). In the 1953 film Kansas City Confidential, hats abound, but in the 1948 movie Criss Cross (which takes place in L.A.), there are quite a few hatless men. (Burt Lancaster comes off an L.A. bus with hat in hand, but he never wears it in the picture.) I have photos of my father (from PA but moved to NYC around 1941) wearing hats up until about 1952; after that, not one, and that was before he moved to CA. The late '80s TV show, Crime Story, has its Chicago detectives wearing stingy brims up to 1964 (which is likely correct), but then shows civilians in Chicago and Las Vegas often sporting lids (which is likely not correct).

 

[PabloElFlamenco]

Once, about 1965 or 1966, two gentlemen wearing raincoat and hats called at the front door I opened; FBI inquiring about our neighbor, ...CIA.
They did wear hats, I remember that clearly.
My mom told them to phone the Belgian embassy, where my dad worked lol

 

[Blackjack]

Living outside of Chicago, I don't really remember a time when hats have gone completely out of fashion. But I do know now you see as many folks wearing hats on the street as not. I can wear a fedora (I prefer the newsboy) and not feel the least bit out of place pretty much anywhere I go.

 

[Inusuit]

Here in Wyoming, the percentage of men wearing hats seems to have remained fairly constant in the 35 years I've lived here. "Gimme" caps (free promotional baseball style cap) have driven out classier hats. (Why do real cowboys wear baseball caps? So they won't be mistaken for real estate agents.) When it's 20 below as it was last weekend, you see a lot of old style wool Railroad caps on folks who work out of doors. The Scotch Cap is also fairly popular and is, I think, a fairly old design. Lots of stiff as a board felt "cowboy" hats show up during Frontier Days, then go back on the shelf until next July.

 

[St.Ignatz]

My Dad never wore a hat, he said he didn't have the head. I'm 56 and I think I see more hats now than when I was a youngster.

 

[Widebrim]

Living outside of Chicago, I don't really remember a time when hats have gone completely out of fashion. But I do know now you see as many folks wearing hats on the street as not. I can wear a fedora (I prefer the newsboy) and not feel the least bit out of place pretty much anywhere I go.

Good to hear that! I guess producer Michael Mann of Crime Story was sort of on the mark...Here in L.A. County, you do see some stingy brims, but not many "traditional" fedoras, expect from some East L.A. homeboys in their vintage lowriders on Sundays, and some old Armenian men in Glendale.

 

[gtdean48]

My father was a sometimes hat wearer = really cold winter days or rain. My maternal grandfather was an avid hat wearer = after a stroke, he was being wheeled out of the house to the ambulance sitting up & stopped them to make me go get his lid! All of his cronies wore hats regularly in my home town as I recall when I left in the late 1970's.
In Atlanta area, the Homicide squad of the police dept are known as the Hat Squad. As a detective & when you solve your first murder case, you get a hat. They look cool on the evening news, even a female detective can be seen sporting a fedora... gtd

 

[Sir Tom]

I recently saw the movie The Little Fugitive, from 1953. It was a low budget independent movie - shot in Brooklyn, using real crowds and street scenes. The hat era was very clearly over by then.

That must have been filmed in the summer. I recently watched a program about the greatest NFL game ever played. It was the Baltimore Colts vs the New York Giants played in December of 1958 at Yankee Stadium. The hat era was in full swing.
A fedora clad man ran out unto the playing field and done a dance until escorted away. It turns out that joker worked for NBC and did it to stop the game while NBC's TV cameras were down.

 

[Dm101]

My father wore a khaki colored fedora with a black hatband from the late 70's and into the 90's.
I haven't seen him wear it in recent years but I don't get to see him that often anymore.
He always wore a hat...like Indiana Jones!
I guess that's where I got it from...lol.

 

[nvilletele]

My father wore a khaki colored fedora with a black hatband from the late 70's and into the 90's.
I haven't seen him wear it in recent years but I don't get to see him that often anymore.
He always wore a hat...like Indiana Jones!
I guess that's where I got it from...lol.

It was the opposite for my dad. He was not a hat wearer. But a couple or so years before he passed away, I bought him a hat at a little shop in Charleston SC (where I had picked up one earlier for myself) and from then you’d have thought he was born with a hat on his head. He loved that hat, and so did I.

So I guess he got it from me . . .

 

[Zombie_61]

The only men in my family who wore hats or caps while I was growing up were my older brother who occasionally wore ball caps, and one uncle who wore a wide brimmed straw hat for sun protection when he was working outdoors. The only time I saw Dad wear a hat was when my brother and his wife took Mom and Dad on a week-long vacation after Dad retired. Dad was wearing a ball cap when they returned; he removed it as soon as my brother and his wife left that day, and never wore it again.

Veering back toward the main topic, there are any number of variables that could have contributed to the decline in hat wearing but I believe one of the major influences was the advent of the automobile and it's increasing popularity. This is purely speculation, but I imagine many men realized they donned their hats as they left the house, took it off in the car while driving, donned it again when they reached their destination, removed it when they entered the building, and eventually decided wearing their hats only for that short walk between their cars and the various buildings just wasn't worth the effort unless inclement weather made it necessary.

 

[deadlyhandsome]

There are times when I question wearing a hat when it’s only from my front door to my car and then from my car the 50 feet to my office. When I go out to eat I often don’t have a good place to keep it as I don’t frequent establishments with coat and hat checks. Sometimes the hat is just a liability or is left in the car. I wear them to work in part because my coworkers have come to expect them. On my days off I spend more hours under them.

As to why hat wearing declined in the first place: I think it was a time where people questioned old customs and they felt freer than past generations to not comply with customs. Neck ties went away for casual apparel (when is the last time you wore a tie while lounging at home?), and jeans became acceptable for respectable men to wear in casual settings. People felt free to question “why” where in previous times conformity was expected.

I think brimmed hats will continue to ebb and flow in popularity, but they will never again come close to being universal as they once were. Additionally, the infrastructure to support widespread hat wearing no longer exists and I don’t see that changing. I like the photos of a sea of men all in hats, but that time has gone and won’t come again.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[Zombie_61]

There are times when I question wearing a hat when it’s only from my front door to my car and then from my car the 50 feet to my office. When I go out to eat I often don’t have a good place to keep it as I don’t frequent establishments with coat and hat checks. Sometimes the hat is just a liability or is left in the car. I wear them to work in part because my coworkers have come to expect them. On my days off I spend more hours under them...

I've had the same experiences, which led to the speculation I expressed in my previous post. One day I realized my hats spent far more time on the back seat of my truck or on an empty seat at a restaurant than they did on my head, and soon after I began to question whether or not I really wanted or needed to bring one with me when I was preparing to leave the house; I imagined men from previous generations doing the same thing.

...As to why hat wearing declined in the first place: I think it was a time where people questioned old customs and they felt freer than past generations to not comply with customs. Neck ties went away for casual apparel (when is the last time you wore a tie while lounging at home?), and jeans became acceptable for respectable men to wear in casual settings. People felt free to question “why” where in previous times conformity was expected...

I've also read that a number of men returning home from the war (WWII, that is) stopped wearing hats as a form of backlash against having been forced to conduct themselves under the military's rules and regulations; now that they were free to make their own choices again, many of them chose non-conformity.