Figure 1.--Fashion magazines in the 19th century were focused on women's fashions, but images of children sometimes appear. Before the Civil War (1861-65) they were European publications and European fashions dominated American fashions. This is a fashion plate from the 'World of Fashion' (May 1838), a British publication. And all we see after breeching is boys wearing long pants. Younger boys might wear pantalettes, but long pants continued go be the dominant style.

The 1830s was the last decade without photography. As a result we know relatively little about how boys dressed compared to the decades with the subsequent photography. But there is information available. There are surviving vintage garments. And there were fashion publications, although they focused primarily on women's fashions. Fashion magazines were all European in the 1830s, but as American fashions were still dominated by European trends they providecsome insughts. The image here is from a Brirish fashion magazine (figure 1). There were also paintings. All of this, however, were a tiny fraction of the photographic record to come. What we see is that American boys virtually all wore long pants. Skeleton suits were declining in popularity, but all we see boys wearing is long pants. Wheter wearig suits or just blouses, we only see boys wearing long pants like their fathers. There was one exception for both boys and girls--pantalettes. The 1830s were very prudish era. Even small children were expected to cover their legs. This was not a problem in the early-19th century when dress skirts were often quite long, even falling below the ankle. But as dress styles became shorter--this was a problem. The fashion answer was pantalettes. Often seen as underwear, pantalettes were a form of pants for younger children and even girls as they got older. Younger boys wore them with both dresses and tunics as we see on the previous page in the Peckham hobby horse painting -- one of the great images of period hobby horses. There we see a very young boy wearing pantalettes, but older boys also wore them with tunics. The fashion press and painted portraits show how boys from fashionable well-to-do families dressed. The small number of paintings give some idea as to how boys dressed, but painted portraits only show how well to-do-families dressed their children. A few genre paintings show how boys from ordinary families dressed. Much of this art was primitive/naive paintings. They do not provide us with great art, but were god-send for fashion historians. Primitive art may be lacking in perspective and other imprtant artistic refinements, but most of thee artists very carefully depicted the clothing in great in great detail, sometimes more accurately than the work of the great mastetrs. And with the added advantage of color which wull be lost in black and white photogrphy for a century. Robert Peckham's work is a good example. Another primitive active in the 1830s was Jefferson Gauntt. At the time Ameruca was a still mostly rural nation. Cities were still limited and only a small but slowly growing number of Americans lived in these urban areas. Rural boys did not dress fasionanly, but all we see are boys wearing long pants. Alas without photography, there are far to images to go on, specially for boys from ordinary families, especilly rural children whuch were the great bulk of the population.

Created: 1:30 AM 11/19/2023
Last updated: 1:30 AM 11/19/2023