Panama Hat styles of late 19th century

[mayserwegener]

1831 reference in googlebooks, Blackwood's magazine.

http://books.google.com/books?id=YL...E0QuwUwAg#v=onepage&q=1831 panama hat&f=false


B

1831 predates the Panama railroad by a good stretch.


It's highly possible the name (in whatever language) goes back even further.

 

[rlk]

Popularization probably goes back to Panama Congress of 1826 with Bolivar. Panama achieved independence from Spain in 1821 and this brought together most of Spanish speaking America and foreign representatives. Panama and Ecuador were both parts of Gran Colombia.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Z8...a=X&ei=zlmHU7-JII-wyATSr4HAAw&ved=0CB4Q6AEwCQ

 

[mayserwegener]

Popularization probably goes back to Panama Congress of 1826 with Bolivar. Panama achieved independence from Spain in 1821 and this brought together most of Spanish speaking America and foreign representatives. Panama and Ecuador were both parts of Gran Colombia.

http://books.google.com/books?id=Z8...a=X&ei=zlmHU7-JII-wyATSr4HAAw&ved=0CB4Q6AEwCQ

Good find!

 

[Brad Bowers]

Cool find, Robert. The 1892 Dry Goods book states that Panama hats are made from the screw pine, which is a completely different species, genus, family, and order than the toquilla plant which is used today. From what I can find, the screw pine is also not native to South America, so I think they're just conflating the names of the plants.

Interestingly, if you read back earlier in the Hat section, it credits the United States with the introduction of what would become the beaver/silk top hat, with Benjamin Franklin bringing it to France. Sounds apocryphal to me, though. I also found it interesting that they stick solely to manufacturing terms for soft and stiff hats, without mention of any kind of popular nomenclature, such as the Derby. Not surprising, but it offers the hint of a suggestion that popular names weren't in popular use until into the twentieth century.

Brad

 

[fedoracentric]

...but it offers the hint of a suggestion that popular names weren't in popular use until into the twentieth century.

This might make some sense when one realizes that the growth of advertising and branding culture in the USA didn't start until the decades after the Civil War. Also, it wasn't until after the Civil War that Americans began to start having disposable income with which to buy branded, advertised items.

 

[Brad Bowers]

True, but the use of the name "Derby" was at least in enough popular use that it shows up outside of advertising as early as 1865 (only five years after its introduction as a style name) in courtroom trial transcripts. Both advertisements and patents in the 1880s used the name, as well, so by 1892 when this book was published, the name was well known. I just found the disconnect odd, on the part of the book, to stick with the manufacturers "stiff hats" and "soft hats" designations, without mentioning popular names, since Dry Good retailers would be familiar with them, and probably use them with their customers.

As to my earlier screw pine comment, Robert posted a link in the Panama Hats thread to an American Hatter article from 1917 that refers to the toquilla as a screw pine, but mentions the correct genus and species, so it does indeed sound like they were using the term screw pine for a plant that isn't the same as what we call a screw pine today.

Brad

 

[fedoracentric]

... so it does indeed sound like they were using the term screw pine for a plant that isn't the same as what we call a screw pine today.

This is big problem in all sorts of studies of history, too, mot just hats. Names and terms change quite often. The most prominent word we can point to today for this changing definition is the word "fag."

Today, of course, it is a comment about a sexual orientation. But only 40 years ago it meant a cigarette. And only some 50 or so years before that it meant to be tired! Three extremely different meanings all for the same word spelled exactly the same way.

Bringing it back to the thread, what they called a "Panama hat" in 1830 may be quite different than what we call them now.

 

[mayserwegener]

You can't exclude Europe. It's possible the name was used there (for example Spain) first. It was definitely known in Germany (Panamahut) as of 1861 (most likely farther back than that).