Figure 1.--This cabinet card portrait of an unidentified American boy shows him wearing a heavy double breasted jacket, looking like a pea coat. The portrait is undated, but was probably taken in the 1890s to us. The photographer was A. E. Warnica in Troy, New York.

Boys suits in the 1850s. These early suits have the look of military style jackets with a rows of large numbers of buttons--often brass buttons. Some of the suits had 30 or more buttons on them. Some were purely ornamental, but some of the suits had to be buttoned. I have noted few double breasted syits before mid-century that did not have a military look to them. Double-breasted jackets appeared we think in the 1870s. Before that boys wore single-breasted jackets and other styles like cut-away jackets. We still need to work out the chronology in more detail. Quite young boys might wear double breasted jackets. We note younger boys with double-breasted kilt suits. We note some collar-buttoning jackets in the late 19th century styled like double-breasted jackets. A good example is an American boy about 1890.