Figure 1.--Here we see three English siblings at the beach on their summer vacation, probably in the late-1940s. (English beaches can be a bit chilly even during the summer. (We are guessing the boys are wearing school caps, but school caps are usually dark colors often with some kind of badge. We are not sure if these are just generic peaked caps rather than school caps.) Notice how school styles can show up even during school vacation. The children look to be about 10-15 years old. The boys look to be wearing sweaters with rugby collars. But as the garmets have collars and they are not wearing shirts underneath, these are knitted tops.

We also see knitted tops for younger boys look like sweaters, but they were often worn without blouses or shirts, so they can not be classified as sweaters. They were commonly worn with knitted pants by younger boys. We also see knitted garment worn as tops by older boys. They may look like sweaters, but the basic difference is that sweaters generally do not have collars, the major exception is the rolled collar. There were a variety of collars. Rughby collars were popular. We are not sure about the chronology, but believe this was the case in the mid-20th century. Knitted tops were worn without blouses or shirts underneath.

Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing Web Site:
[About Us]
[Introduction] [Activities] [Biographies] [Chronology] [Clothing styles] [Countries] [Topics]
[Bibliographies] [Contributions] [FAQs] [Glossaries] [Images] [Links] [Registration] [Tools]
[Boys' Clothing Home]

Created: 7:40 PM 1/23/2024
Last updated: 7:40 PM 1/23/2024