Resistol questions

[Uncle Vern]

Can anyone help me date a Resistol Stagecoach hat? The hat is Cocoa brown ("Canyon,") with 6-inch crown and 3.5 inch stitched brim. I have it in a "Gus" crease. It's a sweet hat, with a nice, soft crown, and the crown fur is silky and long-stranded. The liner is a very pale tan-bronze, and the central image is a gold stagecoach on a deep brown ground, with a gold stripe around the outside of the plastic cover. The sweatband is black, thin, and very supple, with a single gold stripe around the sweatband circumference.
The original shipping label is intact, tucked behind the sweatband, and it states: "style-5281 deadwood, color-009 canyon, brim 3 1/2, size 7 1/2, ticket no. C87371. Price: $60.00.
Does anyone know the approximate age of this hat? Also, I'd like to find out what "Stagecoach" means--there seem to be many old Resistol Stagecoach models. Do the Stagecoach hats represent a certain era? Where they designed for a budget market, or some other specific reason?
Thanks, Uncle Vern

 

[besdor]

Post a picture if you can . It will help alot .:cool2:

 

[hatflick1]

I recently picked up an old western Resistol, silver belly, 5X, looking exactly like an Open Road (ranch type crown), but only a 2" brim.
On the leather sweatband it is marked: Resistol, 5X, Made In Texas...
High Brehm Hats, Alice, New Braumfels.
I am guessing this is a "dude" or dress up hat, although I have seen cowboys wear these stubby brim numbers in cattle drive photo essays over the years.
Any Loungers know anything about vintage western Resistols? Is there a book out there similar to the Stetson history volume?
Many thanks, pards.

 

[J.T.Marcus]

If the brim is bound with grossgrain ribbon, it probably left the factory that way. If the edge isn't bound, chances are it was cut down by either the seller or the owner. This tended to be a "dress" hat rather than a "sun" hat. Take a look at a few episodes of "Walker, Texas Ranger." You will notice C.D. wearing a hat like you're talking about.

 

[Joel Tunnah]

My pre-1968 "Wide Country" has a 2 1/4" brim.

It's not a working hat, that's for sure, but neither was the Open Road.

Joel

 

[Bruce A. Fulmer]

Working Hats?

In the Midwest and West during the 40s and 50s Open Roads and their brethren were working hats, although not necessarily for the lowest laborers. My family members were construction workers and farmers, and ORs were the most common headwear I remember, particularly in the West. Until Stetson cheapened the ORs (60s) my father had two ORs - one for work, and one for dress. He would rotate by sending the dirty hat to a suitable refurbishment place, such as Hatters Inc, and the result was now his "dress" hat. He finally followed the lead of his brother-in-law and bought a silver belly Alessandria circa 1961 when he could not find his 4x 7 1/2 long oval OR locally.

 

[hatflick1]

Resistol History

Thanks for the insight, guys.
I used to have an old west catalog (reproduction) in which it showed mail order items such as saddles, bridles, gloves, suspenders, jeans 'n britches and hats. Many of the cowboy hats were stubby brim Open Road looking styles. Naturally, I can't find the catalog so a trip over to the Autry Western Museum bookstore is in order. I believe it was turn of the last century, maybe early twenties.

 

[John in Covina]

The great outdoors.

I have a light tan 3X Towncraft (JC Pennys) with a shorter brim than my Westward (Dobbs) and as a beater it is marvelous.

We had some interesting discussions on the style and it seems to be less of a cowpoke hat and more of the business man hat but still with an outdoorsman connotation.

 

[Bud-n-Texas]

hatflick, I have 3 Vintage Resistol San Antonio's. I suspect that may be what you have. They are fine hats and I would not trade any of mine. They vary in brim width between 2 1/4" and 3". Ill not debate who wore the hats, as I am a bit young and was not around in order to witness who wore them and what they did. I suspect that these hats were worn by a wide variety of people, white collar, blue collar etc.. Hat brands can be debated on the Lounge all day long, that being said, in my opinion Resistol is one of the better hats. My best advice is enjoy the hat for what it is worth.

 

[J.T.Marcus]

What a great piece of advice! "Enjoy the hat for what it is worth."

 

[Mark George]

Older Resistols

Hatflick1,

I don't know of any books on the subject, and I don't know a whole lot about Resistols myself. What I do know is High-Brehm is a western store that makes their own custom hats (as well as selling other brands, like your Resistol). I think they are now located in Victoria. And, I know Resistol made a series of hats that were named after Texas cities. I have seen Fort Worth, San Antonio, and Waco (I have one of these). I'd bet there are others, too, but I do not know what the differences are. The Waco is pretty much like an OR with a 2 5/8 inch brim. It's a nice hat, as are many of the older Resistols. In my mind, the Resistols were every bit as good a hat as Stetsons, maybe better, and can usually be had at a better price than a "real" OR.

Mark

 

[Uncle Vern]

Very often, in the old days, a man would buy a hat and wear it until it starting going south. Then, he'd buy a new dress hat and keep the old one for knocking around.

Through the years, Resistol made a lot of OR-style hats with varying brim widths. I've seen a lot of them in antique malls around central Texas. Like older Open Roads, the Resistol OR versions had varying crown heights. I can't wear the low crown variety.

Resistol used to make a model called the "Fort Worth, " with a thin, 3-inch brim and a cattleman's block. I believe that model was moved over to the Stetson line years ago. Mine is from the early 50's, silverbelly, with a narrow ribbon. It's sort of an OR, but a West Texan friend of mine calls it a "businessman's" hat, meaning that perhaps it was more appropriate for the banker and the ranch owner, and not the crew, though I stilll see old cowboys here in Austin wearing well-used versions of them.

For the record, I own a beautiful, older version of the Stetson Range, similar to the Resistol Fort Worth, but the felt is thicker, and I prefer the Resistol.
Resistol also made a lightweight OR-style hat with a thin, nearly dress-weight , 3.5-inch brim and a beautiful soft crown. I own one, and it's a beaut.

For a number of years, both Stetsons and Resitols have come out of the same factory in Garland, Texas, although they're made as separate lines. To my eye, they seem to be growing ever closer together in style and appointments, and not nearly as distinct as they used to be.

I've come to really love the old Resistol western hats, especially the versions made during the Urban Cowboy craze of the late 70's to early 80's. They tend to have nice, thin brims that shape easily and hold their block. Resistol seems to have used dozens of subtle colors and endless model names, with widely varying crown heights and brim widths. Some are soft-crowned and some are stiffer. In short, they went nuts, and the results, to me, are beautiful, and far more imaginative than many of the Stetsons of the same period.

 

[hatflick1]

I sense more of a mystique around the older western Resistols than I do the antique Stetsons.
Don't get me wrong, I think the Open Road is a fine example of Americana. Yet the ORs are much more common than Resistols which, as pointed out, had a Route 66 quality in that several styles carried the names of various towns across Texas.
I too, own a San Antonio which, incidentally, has a hand written dedication to the receipient across the inner lining.
As time permits, I will get over to the Autry Museum as the bookstore did once sell the catalogue I previously mentioned in which were featured stubby brim western style hats for, oh, a buck and a half?

 

[GentlemanFarmer]

San Antonio

I have , what I believe, is a Resistol san Antonio that I recued from a vintage shop. I'm only guessing it's a san Antonio as it matches my Stetson OR's dimensions exactly (2 3/4" brim and 4 1/2" crown). It had no sweatband to tell me what it was. Really the best hat I own, after i had it refurbished.

Hey Mark George! Where are you located? And where is that set of doors on your avatar? I'm down to Virginia almost monthly at the family farm near Front Royal.

 

[Farace]

Hi, I recently "won" (didn't really "win" anything, I had to pay for it!) an auction on eBay for a Resistol Jet 707, original list price $28.50. A couple questions:

1) I realize from reading other threads that there's no way to accurately date the manufacture of this hat. There is an original sales receipt in the box dated September 1980. I read in threads on here that Resistol stopped making dress hats in 1968. Is it truly possible that this hat sat in a shop for, at minimum, 12 years before being sold?

2) This hat is in quite excellent shape. It almost seems the original owner hardly wore it. The felt is stiff, the brim snaps firmly, the liner, while not spotless, is mostly clean, the ribbon is in great shape, and even the feather is unmolested. It was a bit too tight (I assume it shrank over the years), but with a bit of steam and wearing it's regaining its original 7 3/8 size. The one problem is the sweatband, which is quite dried out and is split in several places. It isn't uncomfortable at the moment, but eventually I would like to replace it. I have emailed Resistol and am awaiting a reply, hoping they can supply me with a new sweatband. (I assume they're the same for western hats as fedoras.) I'd love to be able to retain the Resistol self-conforming imprint if I can. Does anyone know if Resistol is likely to supply me with a band?

Thanks!

(Image from the original auction.)

--Bob

 

[Matt Deckard]

Do you have a photo of the inside?


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[Farace]

Do you have a photo of the inside?

Yes, I can take some more photos.

 

[Farace]

In case the tag is useful . . .

 

[deadlyhandsome]

In case the tag is useful . . .

View attachment 187082

“Byer Rolnick” on the liner does put the manufacturer no more recent than the late 1960s.

I’ve never heard of the big hat companies selling replacement sweatbands. Finevintagefedoras on Etsy sells pre-cut replacement sweatbands for $25. If you can get to a full-service hat shop that’s about what they charge for the sweatband and installation. There are threads here on how to sew them in on your own if you want to try it yourself.


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[milandro]

I am still looking to find the origins and the felt composition of the Resistol Ohio model that I bought and that was the object of my first post here in the thread “ Any Resistol Experts” . It is one of my favorite hats and doesn’t feel any rougher of stiffer than the Resistol 20X black gold that I also own (for sale here and if I won’t sell it maybe I will do the same conversion that I did on this Ohio). Resistol not only doesn’t answer the emails, but they bounce back! Really weird for a large company to take so very little energy in PR. This one was made for a Dutch group or shop of Western Riders (which no longer apperas exists). Is still one of my favorite hats. I had the brim cut because it was really too large for an urban look and, though still clearly a western hat, doesn’t attract the same amount of attention than it would have otherwise attracted. I have added some new pictures which may help ID.