Figure 1.--Here we see an unidentified boy during April 1912. He wears a white knicker's sailor suit without stripe detailing. The suit is all white, but he has black long stockings. He looks to be about 7 uears old. His family was well to do. He lived on an estate in the toney Philadelphia neighborhood of Philadelphia--Chesnut Hill, some times referred to as Philadelphia Garden District. He is showing off a ball and stick game. The 1910s was the last decade American boys wore wide-brimmed sailor caps. The way the brimis turned up is charactristic of the 1910s.

We are unsure about the social-class conventions. We note quite a few family images of boys from affluent or at least comfiortable families wearing sailor suits. And by the 1910s we have many family snapshots with homes and other settings in the background so we can make some assessment of social class. In the 19th century we have mostly studio portraits to go on. Here we see an unidentified boy in the family estate located in a toney neighbirhood of Phildelpgia--Chesnut Hills during 1912 (figure 1). While we think of sailor suits as primarily an urban middle-class style, we do see them, being worn in rural areas as well. A good example is an unidentified boy with his sisters in 1913. This is notable because the family appears to be a rural family of relatiuvely modest means. We se few working-class bots wearing sailor suits. We arev not entirely sure why this was. There were relatively inexpensive sailor suits available.

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Created: 7:41 PM 4/23/2018
Last updated: 7:41 PM 4/23/2018