Figure 1.-- This American boy wears a short pants sailor suit. The snapshot is undated, but was probably taken about 1930. It looks like the boy is wearing a belt for trouser suspension, but look closely. The belt is purely ornamental, just draped around the waist. The boy has a button-on sailor suit. He looks to be about 8-years old.

Quite a number of younger American boys wore sailot suits with short pants. We note a transition from knee pants to short pants in the early-20th century. The first short pants were quite long, cut rather like knee pants, butt without the ornamental knee hem buttons. This affected the outfits boys wore, including sailor suits. Short pants sailor suits were less common in America than in Europe. Thwre were different kinds of short pants. Button-on and self-belted shorts were very common. Sailor suits in general declined in popularity, especially among older boys. Short pants became more common in the 1920s, but sailor suits in America also began to be worn by increasingly younger boys. We see much older boys wearing short pants sailor suits in Europe. The American boys we see wearing short pants sailor suits were almost entirely pre-school boys and younger boys in elementary (primary school). After about the 3rd grade (age 8-9 years), they become much less common.

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Created: 3:41 PM 7/16/2011
Last updated: 3:33 AM 7/17/2011