Of Hats and Undershirts

Do you remember when all men wore hats? You probably don't actually remember but you can see the old fashion in old movies and TV shows. When I was a kid I think it was just when hats were going out of style. I remember having a hat, but that would have been just one of many ways in which I was not cool as a kid (that's another story).

So I'm not sure just when or why hats began to go out of style. I do remember President John F. Kennedy riding in the presidential limo, on the day he was shot, with no hat, but that was 1963 and I think hats went out of style before then.

Now there is a new fashion for hats. However, the hats that men are wearing have small brims, and they perch atop the head, which makes them look as though they are too small. I personally don't find the look becoming--but, being an old fart, I'm naturally and almost inevitably not likely to approve of the fashions of young people.

I have a hat which I bought some years ago. Sad to say, I never wear it because, in windy Chicago, it tends to blow right off. Women (who I guess also wear hats less often these days) have an advantage there because they use (or I guess, used to use) hatpins to hold their hats on.

Hats serve a practical function, keeping us warm in winter and keeping the sun off in summer, thus protecting sensitive noses, the tops of our ears, and perhaps also the backs of our necks from sunburn. Baseball caps may be the chief head covering that has continually been popular with American males, and I in fact often wear a baseball-cap-style cap in winter and a different one in summer.

All men in America wore undershirts until one movie in which (I believe) Gary Cooper removed his shirt and--had nothing on under it! This may have been a bit startling at the time but evidently men (or women) liked the look, and, as the story goes, the very next day the sale of undershirts took a bit plunge!

So the modern look, definitely fostered by Hollywood, has been for men to wear no undershirts and to show a little skin, or chest hair, at the neck above their shirts (or even leave their shirts unbuttoned part-way down to show still more). But now it looks as though the newest fashion is again to wear an undershirt, often a colored T-shirt. (This is best done, in my opinion, when the color of the T-shirt coordinates with other clothing items being worn.) As for me, I've always worn white T-shirts in the winter, to have another layer of clothing for warmth. And I've got quite a few colored T-shirts, so now I can wear those and feel like I'm in fashion!

So, as we ought to know by now, fashion is continually changing. It's been said that if you just hang on to old clothes long enough, they will come back into fashion.

Update. Expanded July 9, 2012.

Copyright (c) 2012 by Richard Stein