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Japanese boys first began wearing Western-style pants in the late-19th century. It did not become common, however, until well into the 20 century. We do not believe that knickers were ever commonly worn. Knee pants may have been worn in the early-20th century, but we have little information at this time. Japanese boys have mostly worn short and long pants. Short pants were very common in the 20th century for primary-age boys. Secondaty-age boys wore long pants. Long pants became more common in the late-20th century, bith for general an school wear. .
As far as we know, Japanese boys have never worn 18th century knee breaches. Japan at the time was still closed to the West.
Kneepants may have been worn in the early 20th century, but we have little information at this time.
We do not believe that knickers were ever commonly worn by Japanese boys.
Japanese boys at about 12 years of age began wearing long pants. They tended to be dressy pants, usually school uniform pants. Almost all Japanese junior and senior high schools require uniforms. Besides their school uniform pants, Japanese boys would wear slacks. Younger Japanese boys began to more commonly wear long pants in the 1980s. Only in the 1980s did Japanese boys begin to commonly wear jeans. We notice Japanese boys wearing jean shorts in the 1960s and 70s, but apparently Japanese mothers did not like the idea of jean long pants. We also notice boys wearing athletic training pants in the 1980s as shown in the photograph here (figure 1).
A reader writes, "I noticed on this page the training pants have an underfoot stirrup, which I believe was a characteristic of training pants in general in the 1980's. Do you know of any other times or circumstances in which stirrups on pants for boys ever were popular?" I'm sorry, this is not a topic we have addressed yet. We will be pleased to load any information which readers may forward to us.
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