Photo Essays: Uniforms Garments--Boys Headwear Types
Figure 1.-- We noticed boys in the 19th century wearing mortar board or square academic caps. (There are several other terms used for these caps. They were much less common in the 20th century, but we still noted a few choir schools wear the boys wore mortar board caps. The boys had to achieve a certain level of competence before being awarded their mortar board cap.
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British school boys have worn a wide range of headwear as part of their school uniforms or general schoolwear. We noticed boys in the 19th century wearing mortar board or square academic caps. (There are several other terms used for these caps.) They were much less common in the 20th century, but we still noted a few choir schools wear the boys wore mortar board caps. The most common headwear for British boys in the 20th century were the boater and peaked cap. The peaked cap was especially common, becoming almost a symbol for English school boys. We see them worn in other countries, but nowhere were they as widely worn as Britain. To some extent there were age conventions. At some private schools younger boys wore peaked caps and older boys boaters. The one style most commonly worn by boys was the peaked cap. This was especially true at prparatory schools. Before World war II almost all boiys wore peaked caps. After the War they became much less common at state schools. We mostly see them at grammar schools and prepschools. By the 1980s virtually the only schools where they were worn was the prep schools. Boaters were more common at public schools. Most at prep dchools, it was the girls who wore boaters. Boaters were more commonly worn in the early 20th century, but after World war II, you rarely see prep boys wearing them. Almost always it was the peaked cap that prep boys wore with their uniforms, athough by the 1980s many schools had dropped any headwear requirement altogether or just required the caps for the younger boys.
