vintage caps

[tropicalbob]

I just reread Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath" recently and was once again blown away by it. There's a passage where he talks about the absolute necessity in those days of having a decent auto mechanic in the family. The photo above could have been an illustration.

 

[g.durand]

1937, migrant farmworkers along Highway 99 (near where I live today). This could well have been my ancestors, but mine couldn't afford the car, so they had to stay in Texas:

Blackthorn--same with my father's family. They were too poor to leave Texas for California in the '30s. But it looks like you and I made it here anyway, two generations later.

 

[Blackthorn]

Blackthorn--same with my father's family. They were too poor to leave Texas for California in the '30s. But it looks like you and I made it here anyway, two generations later.

Yeah G. Durand, societal evolution, I guess. Interestingly, once we did migrate from west TX in 1954, we "stuck to our own kind," so to speak. All the kids I grew up with were "Okies" like in Grapes of Wrath. All my parents' friends were those who had come west earlier and we were almost an ethnicity of sorts. Living in the bay area, we stuck out from our neighbors, the long time bay area people, but we socialized only with the first generation newcomers. I didn't even realize that was how it was until I was in my twenties looking back on it.

 

[Blackthorn]

Holocaust refugees arriving at Atlit reception camp in Israel, in 1944, picture copied from Jerusalem Post.

http://www.jpost.com/Not-Just-News/Image-vs-reality-The-story-of-Hansi-Brand-389403

 

[scotrace]

Caps.

 

[Blackthorn]

Looks like the exact same cap, but two different guys. Am I seeing that right?

 

[RJR]

It surely looks like it,Blackthorn.

 

[Blackthorn]

It surely looks like it,Blackthorn.

Interesting...

 

[esteban68]

if it's a studio portrait it's quite likely a prop, a friend of mine has his own photography business and he has loads of props and quite a few costume items etc I've sold him!
That cap would have been quite an expensive and sporty item in it's day I guess....and it does appear to be the exact same hat!

 

[Blackthorn]

if it's a studio portrait it's quite likely a prop, a friend of mine has his own photography business and he has loads of props and quite a few costume items etc I've sold him!
That cap would have been quite an expensive and sporty item in it's day I guess....and it does appear to be the exact same hat!

I hadn't thought of that. Good call, Esteban!

 

[Stuffsmith]

I'm sure that's exactly what it is, guys – there are about 25 different images of different guys with that cap on from that photo shoot. It might be my favorite example of an eight dart cap. If it wasn't posted before, this is from around 1926 and they're all Tour de France riders.

 

[GregNYC]

Blackthorn, what you say about hanging out with your own kind in the SF bay area was very interesting. I lived on Belvedere Island across the bay in the mid 1960s. That was a fairly diverse place, culturally speaking. But upper middle class. There were German and Japanese families, a few old WASP families, some old money too. My family were artists who had lived in CA for many years, but in earlier generations in the U.S., were Okies too. On Belvedere Island, the houses were so large that people tended to keep to themselves. I was like ten years old, so I rode my bike everywhere. I even had a paper route, which is how I got to see who lived in all those expensive houses....

 

[Blackthorn]

I'm sure that's exactly what it is, guys – there are about 25 different images of different guys with that cap on from that photo shoot. It might be my favorite example of an eight dart cap. If it wasn't posted before, this is from around 1926 and they're all Tour de France riders.

That is all new info for me, Stuffsmith, I had no idea. Thanks for all the insight.

 

[Blackthorn]

Blackthorn, what you say about hanging out with your own kind in the SF bay area was very interesting. I lived on Belvedere Island across the bay in the mid 1960s. That was a fairly diverse place, culturally speaking. But upper middle class. There were German and Japanese families, a few old WASP families, some old money too. My family were artists who had lived in CA for many years, but in earlier generations in the U.S., were Okies too. On Belvedere Island, the houses were so large that people tended to keep to themselves. I was like ten years old, so I rode my bike everywhere. I even had a paper route, which is how I got to see who lived in all those expensive houses....

Very interesting, Greg. Both of our family histories are pieces of classic Americana. And I also had a paper route. Too bad I didn't know what a newsboy cap was, back then.

 

[Simonds]

There are differences in those french tour caps, note pattern matching and buttons on the straps.

 

[Simonds]

 

[Blackthorn]

Wearing a cap in the snow, 1924, Washington:

 

[Blackthorn]

 

[Blackthorn]

Members of the Irish Army, 1922:

 

[RJR]

The Irish army pic is interesting.