Figure 1.-- Overalls were almost always done as a long pants garment. We have archived large numbers of rural school portraits with boys wearing overals. Almost always they were long pants overalls. We have only found one boy so far wearing short pants overalls, a 2nd grader at the Washinton School in Oklahoma. His friends were all wearing long pants.

Overalls were almost always done as a long pants garment. We have archived large numbers of rural school portraits with boys wearing overals. Almost always they were long pants overalls. And the time that overalls were common was a time when many boys wore short pants or knickers to school. Knickers were virtually universal in urban schools during in the 1910s and 20s. Younger boys might wear shorts, especially in the South. And note that the population before air conditioning and the 1950s, in the southern states includung the southwest was much smaller than it is now. And jeans were not yet popular scoolwear, this also began in the 1950s. We have only found one boy so far wearing short panrs overalls, 2nd grader at the Washinton School in Oklahoma (figure 1).

Created: 10:58 AM 6/24/2019
Last updated: 6:59 PM 6/1/2023