Figure 1.--Here we see two unidentified boys, surely brothrers, wearing Fauntleroy oufits. They look to be about 1-4 year sold. Great care has been tajen with the outfits and the boys' hair. Mother clearly liked the Fauntleroy look. Looking at the portrait, we suspect that the older boy might not have been breeched had the Fauntleroy Craze not have been n so popular. The whicker chair and bevelded edge mount style and colorvsuggests that the portrait was taken about 1900. The studio was A.P. Holand in Grand Forks, North Dakota
One clothing historian believes that the Fauntleroy suit was an important factor in ending the centuries old convention of dressing younger boys in dresses. This seems to us an over statement. But we beliece that the Fautleroy Craze was a factor. She speculates that mothers were so anxious in the lare 1880s and 90s to dress their sons in Fauntleroy outfits that they breeched them earlier than they might have. Of course there were skirted options such as a Fauntleroy dress of a Fauntleroy kilt suit. For whatever reason we see more Fauntleroy kikt suits than Fauntleroy dresses. Even so, the standard Faunteroy suit as decribed and depicted in the book and worn in America was a straight-leg knee pants suit. Bloomer knickers were more common in Britain. The knee pants suit was what most American mothers wanted for their sons. To what extent this influenced the decline of the comvention of boys wearing dresses and other skirted garments, we are not entirely sure. We know of no way of proving this with any certainty.
