Joseph Connolly raises his fedora to the great modern hat revival
Want to get ahead? Get a hat
O
PA IMAGES / EVERETT COLLECTION / PICTURELUX / MIRRORPIX / ALAMY
ldies of a certain vintage may remember when the sight of an unadorned male head was remarkable. Men’s hats were everywhere, as any old film or newsreel will amply demonstrate. Throughout the 19th century and well into the 20th, a gentleman leaving home without a hat, while the sin was not quite on a par with omitting to pull on his trousers, would still occasion censorious comment. He would be seen to be improperly dressed. This convention had to do less with protection from the elements than with the necessary demonstration of class, rank and manners. Men’s clothes pretty quickly informed you what sort of person you were dealing with; the hat alone was an instant and infallible indicator. The cloth cap was indelibly associated with the working classes. This image was
26 The Oldie June 2022
later consolidated by Reg Smythe’s Andy Capp. The gleaming black, silk topper became shorthand for a toff – like Lord Snooty in the Beano. In between, there was every variety of headgear, suitable for all seasons or occasions, each befitting the status of the wearer. The hat had to be politely raised, or at the very least touched, whenever a lady was encountered. Most trades and professions were wedded to a certain sort of hat. So you could instantly tell what people did for a living. The services wore them. The mitre and the academic mortarboard were worn. The bowler hat (with rolled umbrella) became the trademark of the civil service or of a chap who was ‘something in the City’. Most other sorts of worker also had their own distinctive headgear: postmen, train drivers
and bus conductors – even the gas man and the railway porter – all sported a variety of cap with a patent peak and badge. They – and we – knew exactly where they stood. No children’s dressing-up kit was worth its salt without the headgear. The cowboy hat, Davy Crockett cap, policeman’s helmet and pirate’s tricorne were among the favourites. All of them made a welcome change from the school cap, which was still very much a force. Time moved on, and social codes began to relax (some would say unravel). For the gentleman, the spats, gloves and walking cane were the first to go. The hat was tipped, as it were, to follow. John Betjeman wrote about the winds of change in his poem Death of King George V, Left: Andy (cloth) Capp
