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I wore either a ball cap or cowboy hat, either felt or straw depending on the season, continuiously in younger days. Uniform caps or hats during my working years. Now I either wear my felt cowboy hats for "dressed" occassions or an Australian type "outback" hat for everyday wear.
My recent favorite is this:
It's a waterproof oiled buffalo hide hat made by Jacaru. Mine's a little darker and I added a paracord stampede string to it. Soft and warm, really nice winter hat for all uses, my wife still demands the Stetson if we're going out other than shopping. Going to get a mesh vented one for summer wear.
Guys if you spend a lot of time on un-covered outdoor ranges you really need to consider a hat with a brim. Several fellow firearms instructors are having problems with skin cancers on their ears due to just wearing ball caps.
Rob
Proud to be Christian American and not ashamed of being white.
May your rifle always shoot straight, your mag never run dry, you always have one more round than you have adversaries, and your good mate always be there to watch your back.
Because I can!
Never grow a wishbone where a backbone ought to be.
People who don't want skin cancer wear hats in high altitude places like Wyoming. And to keep sun out of your eyes.
Never could figure out why people wear baseball-style caps. Maybe riding in a truck, but they don't protect your neck at all. They look goofy too, to my eyes.
I like the crushable cowboy-style hats. Just can't bring myself to spend $200 on a Stetson, since my hats tend to get beat to hell, and I like to stick them in motorcycle saddlebags too. The problem with those crushables though, is that if you leave them in your truck, which gets really warm in summer, they WILL shrink. I took one of my shrunken hats into the shower to try to stretch it back into usability, which I did, but there ain't much of a crown left in it. I know the hat shops can stretch them for you, but the couple of times I tried that, it hardly made a difference.
Straw in the summer of course. Some people laugh at my straw hats after they have seen hard use. They still work though...
I since found out that cowboy hats are great in the rain and snow too. I like to wear them when I am in downtown Portland, just to get some looks.
I just got my Akubra Territory hat, nice! I usually wear soem sort of brimmed hat in the sun, ball caps when I am cutting logs/trees cause the eaf muffs fit over them!
PaulB wrote: I like to wear them when I am in downtown Portland, just to get some looks.
i live just north of portland, and i always wear a "cowboy" hat.
guess i am too ugly for those looks.
maybe i just ignore other folks, if they want to look, go for it.
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this post has caused me to evaluate my hat etiquette.
people today do not respect personal property like they once did.
i've had my hat kicked,stepped on,splashed with food or drink,even had it smashed behind the
seat of my work truck by a careless co-worker. so most of the time it stays on my head.
would i tip my hat to a lady? you bet.
remove it for a color guard/pledge of allegiance? every time.
movie theater? sure.
FANCY restaurant? probably.
someone's home? i would remove it upon entering, look around for a safe place for it, lacking that it goes back on my head.
if at a get together where they are piling coats on a bed? no way, i'm a bit superstitious, a hat on a bed is bad juju.
There used to be a place here in Tampa called "The Adams City Hattery" that had a sign up that said "the well dressed gentleman always wears a hat." I'd say the main problem is that there aren't as many gentlemen around today. People generally tend to dress down on all occasions rather than dress up. If you look at pictures of Pope and Young while they were out hunting they still wore neckties. The people I do see wearing hats today don't know when to take them off.
If you're gonna be stupid ya gotta be tough-
Isiah 55:8&9
It's easier to fool people than it is to convince them they have been fooled.
I don't know where y'all get this JFK stuff. Maybe he changed the style for those lawyer fellas and politicians on the East Coast. In other urban areas, and notably at least in California, hats for city dwellers in moderate climates (like Los Angeles) went out with the 50's, and didn't emerge again until way after JFK left us.
I recall that, as a very young dude, I saw my father coming home and taking off his hat - a felt fedora, or whatever you call it, like the type that Humphrey Bogart wore. I'll perhaps explain in another posting who HE was to you young whippersnappers.
Our visitors to the house were frequently in the car business, as Dad was. Fashion consciousness and "appearance" used to be important to sales. Until the early fifties (but way before Kennedy), they wore hats, and took them off when they visited our home. Then, hats went away - at least in L.A.
In mountain regions and farming regions where we visited or vacationed, utilitarian hats were more often found, such as wide brimmed rain hats or fur hats for the mountains, and the ubiquitous farmer's ball cap - always in "fashion" due to its utility.
Farms and ranches notwithstanding, I've seen ball caps become quite popular some time AFTER Kennedy (because I was a teenager, then, and they weren't all that popular, and never seen at school where I lived). They weren't even allowed in the classroom, unless you had a documented medical reason. I remember some poor soul with critters in his scalp who was allowed to wear his cap.
Of course, now it's popular to wear your ball cap with the bill sideways, which for the life of me I can't understand, since only one ear is protected from the sun and your eyes get no shade at all. So one ear is white, the other is red; and you get cataracts from sun in the eyeballs. Brilliant.
And, of course, it is now in vogue NOT to tip your hat, or take the greasy nasty thing off when you eat, or even honor the Lord and take it off in church. Go figure!
Now, I can see hats being more popular among the "mature" set - for sun protection, covering up that cute little landing strip on top, and so on. But I suspect that with all the "gangsta" movies, that strongly influenced the re-emergence of the fedoras as a fashion item. And, unfortunately, the gang influence also helped to add to the popularity of baseball caps turned sideways in the cities.
As for folks who are out in the elements and honestly work for a living, or those who are truly devoted fans of some team, I can understand the baseball hat. And for Texans and other folks who live in cowboy type regions of the state or states where the elements frequently come into play, of course the cowboy hat never went OUT of vogue. It's practical for the sunny and rainy outdoors, and it's cool (as in - "sweet" by today's vernacular). It's not too cool if you live in the middle of San Francisco and the only horse you have seen goes around in circles with a pole sticking out of its saddle. But a couple of weird, well known laywers who practice there think they look "hip." (Never mind - another old guy's phrase).
I don't think JFK played into it. Just watch the old movies, then the movies of the 50's, then the 60's through 90's - and Hollywood will show you when the hats became fashionable again.
Last edited by JohndeFresno on Sat Feb 27, 2010 4:11 am, edited 4 times in total.
pokey wrote:this post has caused me to evaluate my hat etiquette.
people today do not respect personal property like they once did.
i've had my hat kicked,stepped on,splashed with food or drink,even had it smashed behind the
seat of my work truck by a careless co-worker. so most of the time it stays on my head.
would i tip my hat to a lady? you bet.
remove it for a color guard/pledge of allegiance? every time.
movie theater? sure.
FANCY restaurant? probably.
someone's home? i would remove it upon entering, look around for a safe place for it, lacking that it goes back on my head.
if at a get together where they are piling coats on a bed? no way, i'm a bit superstitious, a hat on a bed is bad juju.
casual restaurant/burger joint? stays on my head.
just me you understand,ymmv.
I'm pretty much the same way and after having a very nice Stetson stolen off a restuarant hat rack in 1984 my hat stays with me unless they check it, and I haven't been in that fancy a place in over 20 years.
Rob
Proud to be Christian American and not ashamed of being white.
May your rifle always shoot straight, your mag never run dry, you always have one more round than you have adversaries, and your good mate always be there to watch your back.
Because I can!
Never grow a wishbone where a backbone ought to be.
Going to get a mesh vented one for summer wear. 
I know the hat shops can stretch them for you, but the couple of times I tried that, it hardly made a difference.
