Scottish Boys' Garments: Hosiery


Figure 1.-- This is Scottish children Betty and David Millar. We are not sure where they lived in Scotland. The snapshot was taken about 1930. Notice how Betty wears white knee socks. David wears dark turn-over-top socks. The colored bands mean that they were school socks. The double-breasted jacket is probably not a school jacket.

We note Scottish boys wearing a variety of hosiery, including long stockings, knee scocks, and ankle socks. Scotland was a depressed area of Britain and we see a lot of children going barefoot, especially before World War I. We do not note many boys weaing sandals without socks as was common in England. We note boys at a Glasgow school wearing long stockings and going barefoot. Long stockings, however, are not nearly as common as in neigboring Scandnavia. We see many boys wearing knee socks. Knee socks seem more common than in England. This same difference was observeable between northern and southern England. Jere climate was an important factor. Through World War II, knee socks were very common in the early- and mid-20th century. Ankle socks became increasingly common after World War II when long trousers began to become more common. We begin to see this by the 1960s. The same color conventions prevailed as in England with white socks mostly being worn by girls. There were some differences in school uniform sock color between England and Scotland.






HBC







Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing Web Site:
[Introduction] [Activities] [Biographies] [Chronology] [Clothing styles] [Countries]
[Bibliographies] [Contributions] [FAQs] [Glossaries] [Images] [Links] [Registration] [Tools]
[Boys' Clothing Home]



Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing kilt pages:
[Return to the Main Scottish boys garment page]
[Kilt suits] [Scottish kilts] [Scottish school uniform] [Highland dance] [Pipeband]
[Irish kilts] [Irish boys clothing] [Irish step dancing] [Greek kilts]




Created: 6:15 AM 6/5/2014
Last updated: 6:15 AM 6/5/2014