Figure 1.--Here we see three unidentified Illinois brothers. They look to be about 3-9 years old and the clothes they wear showcase popular age-related styles. The younger boy wears a dress with a scalloped collar. His older brother to the left wears a cut-away jacket with knee pants. Given the age differmve it looks to us like mother was breeching theboys at about 4 years of age. The oldest brother wears a collar buttoning jacket, we think with knee pants. The portrait is undated, but the clothes and patterned long stockings suggest the 1870s to us. The studio was Pooley in Gadena, Illinois.

The combination of industrial expansion and agriculutral productiviy along with the fall in the cost of photography meant that the photograaphic record was an increasingly valid indicator of popular trnds. There was still poor Americans that were underepsentative, but they were an increasingly small sector of the population. Thus we believe that the images we see are an incresingly accurate depiction of fashion and social trends like breeching. There was no clear definative age at which boys were breeched. There were substantial differences from fanily to family. And we have no idea to what the differnces can be attributed. We see most parents breeching boys at about age 2-4 years. The Illinois boys picyuted here look to have beem btrrched about age 4 years (figure 1). Smaller numbers were breeched at age 5 years. As most boys were now attending school, beginning at age 6 years, alnost all boys were breeched by that age. And beginning in the 1870s we begin to see the school portait becoming a new popular phenomenon, creating a useful addition to the photographic record--Ameican schools .

Created: 5:27 AM 8/27/2009
Last updated: 10:19 AM 1/13/2020