Women's Hats
Who wore them...and when
Hats were worn for many different things. The
women I saw wearing hats in everyday life in most pictures were older
women though. Here is an example of an array of women gathered to
celebrate the Greenbelt's Women's Club's first birthday, in October
of 1940.1 As you can see, the older women are wearing hats and
the younger women are not.
Younger
women wore them on occasion, but not for no reason. While women did
housework, they did not wear hats. If you look at pictures on Justin's
table of
contents, you'll see that the women are taking food out to cook
and are not wearing hats. They wore them for church. Every woman wore
a hat to church, like here in this picture.2
To learn about
when and where and
what kinds of hats men wore go to Joel
Furfari's page. Seen here in this next picture,
are teenage women jitterbugging at the Greenbelt High School senior prom
in 1942. Notice that they are not wearing
hats.3
They
were worn for
sporting activities and often for driving.4
Women wore scarves like
the one above for driving because many of the cars of the time were open
topped cars. This was how a scarf was worn in the late 1930's, but it
changed the way it was worn in the early 1940's as women began to work in
the factories because men were off in war. Women began to wear scarves to
cover their hair so that it would not get caught in the machines. The
style continued like the way it was in the 30's, but the variation also
was used. A picture seen here is an
example of how they wore them.5
regular / fashionable
Of course what begins as a utility can many times become the
fashion. For
example, ten years ago only painters wore painters pants, but today many
teens own a pair of Carter's pants, a brand of painter's pants, in some
form or another. In the early 1940's hat designers took the head scarf
that working class women used for safety at their job and made it a
fashionable item. Designers changed the material from cotton and replaced
it with satin, velvet, or perhaps a material called jersey. Often times a
matching purse was designed to go with it like the design shown
here.6
Although hats were not as popular during the late
1930's, they were still made and worn. After all, people needed to wear
hats to church, for sports, for outings, etc. Feathers were very popular
additions to a hat. Hats were made of felt, straw, leather, velvet,
jersey, and cotton. Hats were made small to be perched on the head and
many times tilted forward. Hair was tied at the nape of the neck and hats
were perched on top. Some of these hats were called doll hats because
they were so small.7 The one shown below is an example of a
typical hat with a feather.8
Endnotes
1) Williamson, Mary Lou. p.112
2) Williamson, Mary Lou. p.94
3) Williamson, Mary Lou. p.131
4) The Modes in Hats and Headdress p.312
5) Warren, Geoffrey. p.146
6) Warren, Geoffrey. p.146
7) Five Centuries of American Costume p.166
8) Warren, Geoffrey. p.145
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