Figure 1.-- This dapper American boy in cabinet card portrait is unidentified. He wears what looks like a cut-away jacket and vest with knee pants. A detachable collar, white tie, and botinaire complete the outfit. He also has elegant leather gloves. Note the homberg hat on the blaistrade. The portrait is undated, but looks like the early 1900s to us. The studio was J.B. Scholl in Chicago, Illinois.

Gloves are today though of as winterwear. In the 19th century they were much more commonly worn and not restricted to just winterwear. This continued into the very early-20th century. They tended to be worn much more frequently than is the case today. Gloves were considered an essential part of formal wear. And often worn when going out. We are less sure to what extent boys wore them. They do not appear commonly in the photgraphic record. And if they were commnly worn you might expect this. And even for formal occassions we do not think they were very common. Studio portraits mostly showed children dressed up, but rarely do we see gloves. We think girls wore gloves more than boys, but even so they are not common in the photographic record. And we believe if they were common for children they would show up to some extent in the phogograpic record. We do see a few boy wearng gloves, but not very many. And the few we do see are mostly teenagers.

Created: 2:21 AM 3/15/2014
Last updated: 2:21 AM 3/15/2014