Figure 1.--The unidentified boys, presumably brothers, wear white tunic suits with black long stockings. The tunics are styled differently. The younger boy has a Peter Pan collar, his older brother a sailor collar. The boys look to be about 4-7 years of age. The tunic was a skirted garment, but were worn with pants--usually bloomer knickers. We assumed that these boys would have been seen as having been see as breeched. We are not sure if the boys wouls have been seen as having been breeched or what kind of other outfits the boys would have worn. This is a postcard back snbapdhot taken in 1916. Yhe bous were from Toledo and Thurston, Ohio.
Breeching depended somewhat on the type of shirted farment the boy was wearing. Dresses and skirts were pretty straignt forward. Both boys and girls normally wore pantalettes with both these garments in the 19th century. Kilted garments were a little different. We were are not entirely sure what was worn with Highland kiltsband and varied from family to family. And in this case the boys were often already breched. This depended somewhat on the age of the boy. Highland kilts could be worn bu younger boys not yet breeched as well as older boys already breeched. In the later case it would have been just one outfit and the boy probably had suits with pants. Highland kilts were much less common in American than Scotland or even England. Klit suits were a very different matter indeed. Nowhere were kilt suits so prevalent as in America. We se them in Scotland and England as well as in other countries, but it was in America that the kilt suit became a atandad item for boys, at least middle-class boys. And here a boy may have been breeched, at least we see some boys weating matching pants ith kilt suitgs. We are not entire;y sure, however, that this constituted breeching, we have never seen any written references to it. Tunic suits were a special case at least by the turn-of-the 20yth century. Tunics by this trime were especially popuolar and were worn with bloomer knickers. Thus the boy would have been breched for this skirted garments. We are not suure, however, if these boys wore other kinds of pants besides bloomer knockers. This of course can not be derermined unless perhaps we have a family album.
