Figure 1.--German boys in the 1920s wore a varierty of suits, both single and double breasted. They also wore both short pants and kneepants suits. Sailor suits were also popular for First Communion. Both the teacher and the priest who taught religion can be seen in this portrait. |
We have at thuis time relatively few glimpses of German First Communions during the 1920s. We do have one portrait of what looks to be a class in a German boys school. It does not look like a Catholic school as both the teacher and priest are in the portrait. This would have been common in the 1920s before the NAZIs as religion was a sibject in most schools. In many areas the population was predoninately one religion. So in Catholic states like Bavaria, a priest might come into the state schools to teach religion. This ended when the NAZIs seized power. The boys in this 1920s class wear a wide range of outfits. Sailor suits seem popular as do suits with Norfolk stylings such as belts. Two boys are quite formally dressed while others have open collars.
We have at thuis time relatively few glimpses of German First Communions during the 1920s. We do have one portrait of what looks to be a class in a German boys school. It does not look like a Catholic school as both the teacher and priest are in the portrait. This would have been common in the 1920s before the NAZIs as religion was a sibject in most schools. In many areas the population was predoninately one religion. So in Catholic states like Bavaria, a priest might come into the state schools to teach religion. This ended when the NAZIs seized power.
The boys in this 1920s class wear a wide range of outfits. Sailor suits seem popular as do suits with Norfolk stylings such as belts. Two boys are quite formally dressed while others have open collars. We wonder if the boys had opinions about the different styles that they all wore.
The sailor suits all vary. The dark suits perdominated. All the boys in sailor suits are in the back row for some reason. The boy on the right has a pocket handkerchief, a plain white dickie and a white ribbon to keep the front tied. His sailor blouse appears to have three white stripes two blue on the collar and two white stripes one blue on the cuff. The boy on his left wears a sailor suit with a navy dickie with two white stripes and one blue stripe on the collar, cuffs and dickie. He also appears to have a white ribbon to keep the front tied and maybe an insignia on his blouse sleeve. The boy on his left wears a navy sailor suit with three white stripes and two blue stripes on his sailor collar. His dickie is plain navy. He does not appear to have any ribbon on his front ties. The boy in the back row on the very left wears a white sailor suit with a navy collar and three white stripes and two navy stripes on the collar. His dickie is plain white and the front ties are tied with a white ribbon. He may be wearing a flower pinned to his blouse. The boy to his right is wearing a vested dark colored suit. The white shirt is worn with an open collar, the vest has a lapel and the jacket is single breasted. Is he wearing a watch fob? The boys in the front row from left to right. The boy is wearing a collared shirt with a tie and a double breasted dark collared short suit. His white knee socks have a striping just below the top. His shoes look modern with a design
on the front.
We note quite a range of suit and jacket styles. Not only were sailor suits popular, but there was quite a dicersity of other boys' suit styles as well.
Double-breasted suits: One boy in the front row wears a double breasted light colored jacket with a white open collar shirt and what probably is a flesh tone or light colored dickie. He also wears an ornament on his jacket. Another boy in the front riow wears a light colored double breasted belted jacket with a white open shirt. Beneath the shirt he is wearing a mock turtle neck shirt or dickie.
Single breasted suits: A boy to his left wears a single breasted light colored Norfolk styled jacket with a white open collar shirt. I cannot make out whether he is wearing a shirt or dickie under the white open collar shirt.
Norfolk suits:Several of the boys wear suits with some element of Norfolk styling. Belts seem especially popular. The second boy to the left on the back row wears a Norfolk jacket and open collar.
Other suits: One boy in the back row appears to be wearing a jacket, tie, modern collar with another shirt over the collar of the jacket. He wears a flower or some ornament on the jacket.
Bavarian jacket: One boy wears a checkedf Bavarian-style jacket with velvet collar. Perhaps he normally wore lederhosen, but not for Fiest Communion. The jacket is single breasted and designed to be buttoned. He also wears a white shirt with light colored tie. He wears plain shorts (not part of a suit I think) and white turned down woolen knee socks. They look very itchy. He wears high laced shoes typical of the 1920s. The shoes were popular for ankle support.
Two boys wear rather formal outfits, rather standing out from their classmates. Both short and long pants were worn with these formal outfits, but interestingly both involve strap shoes and shite socks. One boy in the front row wears a very formal long pants oitfit. He appears to be wearing a plain white blouse (it looks more like a blouse than shirt) with a jacket that buttons at the collar only. The collar on the blouse is Eton style. He has some ornament on the jacket. I cannot make out how fancy the blouse is. The pants legs looked like they have been turned up for. Perhaps an older brother wore the same suit for his First Communion. He also wears strap shoes with white socks (I think anklets but that is a guess). Another boy in a formal outfit is standing at the center. He wears white kneesocks with strap shoes. We wonder how commonly these boys wore these outfits.
One of the most intreaguing aspect of this portrait is the diversity of collars show. Some are standard types, well known to HBC. Other appear rather distinct. Perhaps they were popular in Germany, but we have not seen similar styles in America, England or France. Particularly puzzling is that some boys appear to be wearing outfits with two collars. Other boysOne boy in do not wear shirts with collars, but rather dickies--even somne boys who are not wearing sailor suits. One boy in the back row appears to be wearing a large ronded collar, rather similar to an Eton-styled collar on his shirt with a floppy bow tie, and a plain belted jacket. He appears to have some sort of ornament or maybe flower pinned to his jacket.
Bows were common neckwear in late 19th and early 20th century. Here only two biyswear bows. Even one of the boys in the formal outfits sdoes not wear a bow. Most of the boys wear modern looking neckties. Other wear open-collar shirts or dickies which did not require ties.
Dickies are usually associated with sailor suits. There are both plain white dickies nd obes with striping worn with the sailor suits. We notice two boys here wear plain dickies matching their regular suits, rather than a shirt and tie. This was not a common style. Normally dickies were only worn with sailor suits.
Almost all of the boys here wear short pants, although they are styled like kneepants with the ornamental buttons. The shorts are mostly parts of suits matching the jackets. The only boy in the first row wearing long pants wears a very formal outfit. We do not know about the boy in the back row. Presumably they wear short pants also, but some of the boys in sailor suits are wearing long pants--we note at least one. The boy in the white sailor suit seems to be wearing short pants, his long pants are either very short on him or he is wearing short pants. Maybe that explains the white color. The boy next to him is also wearing short pants, white socks and low lace or strap shoes (you cannot be sure from the image). The two boys next to him you cannot tell for certain what kind of pants but you can make out that they wear lace shoes. About the two boys in the back row standing to the right, the boy in the sailor suit is definitely wearing long pants and shiny
black shoes. The boy directly to his left is definitely wearing short pants, white socks
and modern looking black lace shoes which are also very shiny. Concerning the boys in the front row. All but two of the boys wearing short pants have the ornamental three side buttons.
Most of the boys wear kneesocks, but even here there is some variation. One boy wears three-quarter socks--the socks appear to be half hose. Most of the boys wear socks and stockings that are solid colors. I think this was in part the solemnity of the occassion, muted solid colors were considered most appropriate. The boy wearing half-hose is the exception here, but one boy has kneesocks with patterened tops and another boy has socks with faint striping. Some of the boys are wearing white kneesocks. One boy wears light-colored long stockings. One boy in the front wears half socks that he has pulled up like kneesocks, but they do not go all the way. They have a kind of striped pattern on the top part of the socks, but the bottoms are plain. He also wears modern looking low-cut shoes. The boy wearing long stockings appears to be wearing long underwear to at least his knees and rather curiously appears to be wearing a knee sock under the stockings
on his right leg. Note that he wears lighr-colored stockings. Black stockings would have been considered more appropraiate in the 1910s.
Most of the boys wear high-top lace up shoes. At least three boys wear low-cit coxfords. At least two boys wear strap shoes. The boy in the white sailor suit appears to be wearing high top shoes since you can see the laces.
All of the boys standing and sitting have similar hair cuts. They are akk shoert, but not cropped as might be common in the 1910s.
This image illustrates the important role that religion played in the German public schools through the 1920s. Note the priest standing with the teacher. When the NAZIs seized power in 1933, they took a very different approach to the role of religion in the schools. Preoests were no longer welcome in German schools.
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