Interesting coathanger

[JEEP]

A friend of mine gave me this today:

He told me it was something he had found at his grandmother's - at first I thought it was a knife, as I collect knives. But this is what was in the holster:

A folding coathanger! The design is simple, but quite clever. It is made from cromed steel with a yellow plastic cover on the base of the hook.

It is stamped "Dejulla" PAT.ANM:

I have no idea about the age, but it is definetly not new.

I just had to share this, in all it's simplicity I think it is quite cool.


/Jakob

 

[Vintage Betty]

At first glance, it looks like a 1920's travelling coathanger, with a handmade case by the owner.

Very cool and thanks for sharing!

Vintage Betty

 

[JEEP]

That old? I honestly hadn't thought that

Thanks.


/Jakob

 

[Vintage Betty]

Well, it might be as late as the 1960's, but here's what led to my guess:

The 1920's had smaller heads on their coathangers due to using armoires, etc as closets. Most standard homes didn't have built in closets during this period. The poles for these closets were quite small, as were the closets themselves. The head of the coathanger looks to be quite small. As homes grew past the wartime era, their closet size and the poles in the closets grew too. We have large sized coathanger heads today, to accomodate our larger poles and larger closet space.

The cover of the coathanger looks to be a retro-era design. Now this alone didn't give me a hint, but combined with the next hint I believed it was 1920's. I doubt a manufacturer of the 1960's would have been so kind as to place a cover device for the extra few pennies it cost to manufacturer and add to the device.

The third clue was the font on the hanger. Most retro era design can be traced back to a font (which is how I'm sometimes so quick to jump the gun) and the manufacturer name looks Edwardian-Victorian Script font, but the word Patent looks to be a later font, but not quite the 1930's clean cut deco font - it looks to be a predecessor.

And lastly, the hanger itself is quite small, leading me to believe it wasn't meant for the heavy coats and garments of the later period.

If this was a later item, I also believe it would have a plastic travel case. That doesn't mean there wasn't one, and it wasn't available and a new one made, it just means I'm guessing again.

Vintage Betty

 

[dhermann1]

Also, that little piece of yellow plastic looks like Bakelite, or one of the other early plastics, maybe Catalin.

 

[Warbaby]

Well, it might be as late as the 1960's, but here's what led to my guess: <SNIP>
Vintage Betty

I think you're spot-on with the date. AFAIK, these were intended primarily for "business travelers" - travelling salesmen. They were easily carried and let you hang your jacket neatly in the train or bus.

I agree with dherman - the handle certainly looks like Catalin to me.

 

[JEEP]

I am constantly dasseled by the seemingly infinite stream of knowledge flowing on this board

Thanks again.


Regards.

Jakob