Figure 1.--This English commercial postcard probably dates to the 1910s. Notice how he wears his hat behind his head and held on by the chinstrap. Also notice the long wide stramers handing down from the hat.

Chin straps were very common for hats, but rarely for caps. This is a difficult topic to address. It is not a topic much discussed in fashion circles. We know from vintage clothing that hats not caps were commonly done with chin straps. This includes just about all wide-brimmed and other sailor hats. As gar as we can tell, they were done in both string and elastic. Some seem thick and others are quite thin. We think that this seems more common when the chin straps were done in elastic. We are still trying to work this out. What we do not know is to what extent boys actually wore them. It is possible that it was quit common as younger boys were dressed by mother or a nanny and thus usually just accepted how they were done up. It was possible to fold the chin strap into the inside hat band. Thus we do not know if the boys did that or actually used the chin straps. Because most if the available photographic images are from the 19th century, we rarely see the chin straps. Chin straps were not needed inside a photographic studio. Either the boys were not wearing the hats or not using the chin straps, at least it looks like it in the portaits. After the turn-of-the 20th century we begin to see family snapshots taken out of the studio. This we know little more, but this is a very short period while the wide-brimmed hats were still in fashion. we see the boys wearing the hats on their heads, but the chin strps are difficult to see. We also on a few occassions see the boys wearing their hats behind their heads, held in place by the chin strap around the neck (figure 1). It is mostly in outdoors photographs that we see the chin straps and most commonly with sailor hats.

Created: 10:41 PM 7/25/2014
Last updated: 10:52 PM 3/28/2025