Figure 1.--This is a trimmed-down cabinet card to create an oval format. As the bottom as trimmed e do not know who the photographer was. Nor do we know the date it was taken, but would guess the late-1870s, in part because of the modest-sized collar and small bow. The unidentified boy looks to be about 5-6 years old. He wears a pleated skirt which his mother probably called a kilt. As was almost universal with these skirts and skirt-like kilts, he also wears long stockings.

We do not yet have sufficient information to build a meaningful chronology of skirts in America. Our information on the early-19th century is very limited. Only after the development of photography do we begin to see many examples of boys wearing skirts. We do note boys wearing skirts beginning in the 1860s as a result of the expolsion of photographic images resulting from the inroduction of the CDV. Certainly it must have been common earlier. Notably kilts and kilt suits were not very common in the 60s. This changed in the 1870s when we begin to see more kilts and fewer skirts. Just when skirts first became commonly worn by younger American boys we are not sure. we see boys wearing skirts in the 1880s and to a lesser extent the 1890s, especially the late 1890s. Here the photographic record provides great detail on the late-19th century. Skirts seem to have been an informal style, so they may have been under-represented in the photographic record. Skirts for boys were much less common after the turn-of-the 20th century.

Created: 3:21 PM 3/29/2013
Last updated: 3:21 PM 3/29/2013