Figure 1.--Perhaps the garment most associated with Germany is lederhosen. They are not, however, a specifically boys' garment. |
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HBC has only limited information on German boys clothes. HBC believes that they have generally followed styles developed in England, France, and other European countries. There do not appear to have been a lot of boys' clothing styles actually developed in Germany. The one exception appears to be lederhosen. One of the most popular styles in Germany was the sailor suit which was commonly worn by German boys until the 1940s. German boys like most Europen boys commonly wore kneepants in the late 19th century and short pants from the 1920s through the 1950s. Modern German boys have adopted the pan-European style of jeans, swat shirts, sneakers, and other casual clothes.
Various terms have been used to describe Germans. Thuis haveen complicated by the fact until the late 19th cenntury there was no united German state. Even Chancellor Bismarck saw himself as more of a Prussian han a German. In addition large numbers of Germans lived outside of the boundaries of German states, some as far east as the Volga. This became a major issue in Germany after World War I and one the NAZIs played upon. Today in Germany citizenship is open to anyone who can show German ancestry.
The following basic chronology is available on German boys' clothes. There have been times that boys clothong had many similarities througout Europe. At ther times there were destinctive national styles. Germany has never been considered a focal point of fashion. The country was in fact was in fact one of the more important counties affecting boys's fasgions, but this hasd varied significantly over time. At this time, HBC has only limited information on the 19th century. Hopefully our German readers cam help develop information in this era. As we have observed in other other European coubties, there has been a destinctive bluring of national styles beginning in the 1960s. Even so, some German styles have enfured. We have begun to collect, however, considerable information on 20th century styles. HBC has been developed primarily through assessing available images, in part because HBC has not yet found any historical accounts addressing German boys' clothes.
Some basic informatin is available on the garments worn by German boys. HBC has at this time very limited information on 19th century German boys' clothes. German boys do not seem to have worn Fauntleroy suits as much as boys in Frace and other neighboring countries. The garment most widely associated with German boys is lederhosen, but they are no longer commonly worn. Perhaps no other garment was more commonly worn by German boys as sailor suits. Like English boys, German boys never wore smocks to any great extent as was th case in France, Italy, and several other European countries.
German boys commonly wore short pants in the early and mid-20th century like many other European boys. Kneesocks were common and boys wore white kneesocks on drress occasions. Many boys wore shorts year round. Long stockings were worn with shorts during the winter months.
The great majority of images on HBC are single shot portraits or snapshots. We have a few sections where we have a set of images on the same boy or family to see how fashions varied over time. What we do not have, however, is how the various garments intereacted with each other. Getting dressed is a relatively simple matter today. Earlier it was more complicated. Here in this section we also see how children got dressed. Children might wear button on clothing. There were also undewaists to hold up pants and stocking supporters to hold up long stockings. Underwear also used to be different and without central heating a more important part of a child's wardrobe. We thought it might be useful to take a family with five children and show all the steps in getting dressed. We will do this over time. The children are Klara (almost 1 year old), Friedrich (4 years), Margarete (5 years), Charlotte (10 years), and Hans (12 years). We have chosen a middle-class family living in a ??? city under comfortable circumstances. As a historical tool we also add images of how the children might have dressed if they were not from a middle-class family. We will show how the children dressed at different stages from underwear to overcoats. Our intention is to show this during decades to illustrate how the process of dressing and the fashions would have changed over time. We are using HBC as a source of information for the garments illustrated.
Paris and London were perhaps the two most important centers of the fashion industry in Europe. Berlin and Vienna were, however, in the early 20th century also of considerable prominance. Jewish clothing designers and manufacturers were prominent in both Germany and Austria. Jews also owned some of the most prominent department stores. The NAZIs even claimed that the department stores were a threat to German industry. Less prominent Jews owned countless retails establishments both making and selling clothes. The NAZIs changed the character of the German fashion and clothing industry forever. The first major action taken against the Jews in Germany was a well planned boycott of German businesses which Propaganda Minister Goebbels announced on April 1, 1933. The NAZIs began the boycott in every city and town at
10:00 AM. Uniformed, often armed Stormtroopers were placed in front of store or business owned by Jews. The boycott was not aimed at the clothing industry specifically, but it was one of the industries most affected. Clients were often stopped from entering. The names of those people who continued buying from Jews was posted in city newspapers. Patronizing Jewish shops became grounds for divorce. Stormtroopers were also placed at the
offices of Jewish lawyers and doctors. The NAZIs in May 1933 established the Association of
German Aryan Clothing Manufacturers (ADEFA) in Berlin under the Reich Ministry of Economy to oversee the Aryanization of the German fashion industry. The ADEFA label in German clothing
certified that the garment had been manufactured "by Aryan hands only." Aryanization was the forced transfer of Jewish-owned businesses to German "Aryan" ownership. The NAZI Aryanization process had two stages. First there was "voluntary" stage, from which Jews were excluded from German economic life. Even during this stage Jewish owners would arrive at their business as simply be told that they no longer were the owners. The compulsory stage that began immediately after Kristallnacht. In this final stage, Jewish-owned
businesses that had not already been "Aryanized " were liquidated within a few weeks and transferred to The NAZI government "trustee". Jews who fled Germany had rgeir property confiscated. For the most part, even after World War II, the Jews who survived were never compensated for their business that were taken from them. The exclussion of the Jews had the impact of ending the the fashion prominence of Berlin and Vienna, a prominence that has still not been recovered.
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HBC has at this time only limited information on hair styles worn by German boys. Virtually no information is available on early 19th century styles. In the late 19th century, many school boys appeared to have had their hair shaved. The long hair styles worn by some French and American boys do not seem to have been as popular in Germany. In the early 20th century, Dutch boy bangs (probably called page boy cuts) were popular for younger boys. This style appeared again in the 1970s--perhaps one of the many cultural impacyts of the Beatles.
We have noted that many German mothers liked to dress their children in identical outfits. This practice seems to have been especially popular in Germany, We do not have any sustantiation of this yet, but we have noted numerous photographs of brothers and sisters wearing identical or coordinated outfits.
Here we will follow family fashions over time. HBC has decided to also gather information on entire families. One of the limitations of HBC is that too oftn we just view boys' clothing in contex with what the rest of the family was wearng. This will help to compare boys' clothing with that worn by mothers, fathers, and sisters. These images will help show show differences in both age and gender appropriate clothing.
HBC has collected information on a variety of activities in which German boys have participated in over time. Many of these activiities involve specialized costumes. Other images show trends in German boys' clothing over time. Some of the activities include choir, choir, dance, games, religious observation, school, sport, and many other activities.
Germany is a predominantly Protestant country. The Reformation was born in Germany with Marin Luther posting his "95 Thesis. The resulting religious wars devestated Germany, especially the 30 Years War. Luthernism is the primary Protestant denomination. There is, however, a very sunstantial Catholic minority, especially in southern Germany. Boys of course dress up to go to church. Often new suits
are bought for First Communion and Confirmation. In southern Germany, but mostlty Austria, there is also Firmung. Boys wear a variety of dress outfits for relious events ceremonies associated with formal religious events. Cathiloic boys often have special suits for first communion or seerve as altar boys. Protestant boys may get new suits for communion or confirmation. Boys may also have costumes for weddings, serving either as the ring bearer or ushers.
Germany until very recently was divided into a number of destinct states with sibstantial social, cultural, political, and religious differences. Only in 1870 was a unified German Empire formed and even then substantial differebnces remained among member states. It was not until the Wimar Republic and even more sp the Third Reich that the destinct legal and cultural differences of the German states began to breakdown. HBC at this time has only limited information on the extent tio which these differences were reflected in clothing. We know that lederhosen were more common in Bavaria than other areas of Germany. We know that clothing styles in Alscae-Loraine differed from France, but we do not know how common German styles were. [Alscae-Lorraine is now part of France, but in 1871-1919 and 1940-44 were annexed by Germany.]
Folk or ethnic costumes are now somewhat romanticized versions of clothing styles that were once worn in Germany. The lederhosen outfits worn in Bavaria are probably the most widely recognized Herman folk costume. There are, however, many different outfits worn in the ifferent regions of Germany. Before modern communication and mass media there were significant differences between different regions. Note that this section deals with folk costumes and not differences in ordinary clothing and fshion conventions within Germany.
HBC has largely focused on clothing and fashion, but another fascinating topic is manners and culture. Just as clothing in the 19th and early early 20th century were more formal, so were manners. Girls courtseyed and boys bowed and doughed their caps. Not only were social conventions more formal, but there was a much more static social class structure. This was not just a matter of the still powerful aristoicracy in Imperial Germany, but prospects for working-class children were relatively limited. Most working-class children attended primary school, but relatively few went on to secondary schools. There were no formal restructions. But few working-class children had the money to afford further education. And as there parents were not well educated, their academic preparation was also lsacking as well as parental support for further education. Substantial changes occurred after World War I. The War largely invalidated the clame of Germany's ruling class of competency. (The same occurred in other Eiropean countries.) This War had been a factor in promoting informality in clothing. We suspect the same is true of social formalities as well. It also created a rising demand for political power and alosening of class barriers by the working class. In Britain and France the same process caused a rise of democratic parties demanding social change. In Germany and Italy it led to the rise of Fascism.
Germany in the 20th century is one of the countries most associated with pgotography. We have much less information on the 19th century. The first available commercil photographic process was the Daguerreotype which was developed in France at the end of the 1830s. We note large numbers of dags, mostly in cases from the 1840s and 50s in America. And by the 1850s other processes like anbrotypes appeares. We have not yet found substantial numbers of German dags or ambrotypes. We are sonewhat confused by this as surely there must have been mny dags made as although Germany was not yet united, it was one of the more prosperous areas of Europe. We do note large numbers of CDVs in Germany beginning with the 1860s. The CDVs basically made dags and ambrotypes obsolete. Most families of any affluence would have a DDV album, sometimes several, in the parlour. CDVs seem to gave been the principal formt form most of the late 19th century. Cabinent cards do not seem to have been as popular in Germany as they were in America. Most studio portraits were CDvs. We note large numbers of snapshots after the turn of the 20th century. Photography seems to have been more popular in Germany than in any other European country. Families through World War II would combine albums. Some times children would put together their own albums. Snapshots were pasted on blacl paper sheets. Germany became a leader in pgotography, including color photography. Agfa was more common in Europe than Kodak. World War II changed that.
We have begun to collect information on German institutions careing for children. Our informnation is very limited, but we have begun to archive some information. The most obvious is schools. We notice a variety of instutions unique to Germany although we see similar facilities in some other European countries. They seem to have been related to the schools. The children during the summer or other school vacations went on group outings to various vacation spots. Group homes were established there for the children. There were also charity institutions, although here our information is limited. We are not sure about work houses as was the case in America and Britain. We do know that there were orphanages. Here there was a substantial need after the two world wars, especially World War II. There were also health facilities like sanotariums. Another type of institutional facility were reformatories for youth offenders.
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Movies made in Germany provide some insights into contemporary boys clothing. Because of the language barrier, these films have not been widely circulated in the United States. I know little about the movies, but they do provide useful glimpses into clothing trends.
There is a great deal of fashion information in literature. As it is literature and not actual history, the comments on clothing have to be taken with caution. Authors vary as to how accurately they write about fashion and other historical cultural matters used to flesh out their plots and characters. Of course the most reliable fashion references are those in contemprary works. There are various types of literature of interest to HBC. We note useful information in both novels and children literature. Of special interest to HBC is the large number of boy characters in British literature. Of course one helpful aspect of many books are the often fascinating references or even discussions of clothing.
A great deal of information is available from clothing catalogs. The earliestappeared in the late 19th century, although magazines illustrations appeared eralier. These catalogs help provide very useful time-line data. While not as realistic as a photograph, they often provide helpful dscriptions indicating sizes (which help explain the age range the garent was made for), color, material, and notable features of the garments.
Much of the ground work for photography was developed in France. Germany was one of the countries that quickly embraced the new process. We do not have a great deal of information on photography in Germany. As far as we know it developed along the same lines as in other European countries. We note a few beautifully colorized German portraits even in the 1890s. And example is a portrait of an unidentified Thorn family. As far as we know these were painted black and white portraits. We do not note similar portraits in other countries. We do know that German was a leader in color photography. This probably reflects in part the importance of the German chemical industry. Agfa became a leader in color photography.
Germans are noted for their high-quality cameras, at least until the advent of digital photography, and the photographic record shows how popular photgraphy was in Germany. These photographs provide a wealth of information about German children and German society in general. Most of these images are fairly easy to assess, especially with the hrlp of our German readers who have provided their insights. Some images are less easy to assess. One aspect that has confused us somewhat is a large number of snapshots of unidentified groups. Some groups are easy to idebtify: families, school classes, sports teams, anf youth groups. Some of these images do not see, to fall into any of these categories. HBC also occassional comes accross some images which totally mistify us. We archive German images here that we simply can not explain. These are images we know to be German. We can also often date them--we just can not explain what is being depicted. Hopefully our German readers can help explain what is happening in these images.
HBC has received a few accounts about German boys or foreign boys in Germany. These accounts provide a great deal of useful information needed to build our German section. Hopefully German readers will provide some additional accounts. Unfortunately we have at this time few accounts from German boys in Germany. We have noted a great many German visitors to HBC and we hope that some will eventually submit some personal accounts.
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