Costumes of English Literary Characters: Just William and Eton Collars


Figure 1.--By the time of the Just William books which behan in the early 1920s, the popularity of Eton collars were declining and boys were increasingly wearing them only for special occasions. Some private schools still required them, but the average middle-class boy would wear them mostly for special events.

I do not recall William ever wearing an Eton suit, but he did on many occassions don an Eton collar which was usually sescribed as a "stiff" collar, to which he would object to mightly. This was particular common in the early books written in the 1920s. The Eton collar was still widely worn in the early 1920s, but rapidly declining in popularity as more and more boys wore soft collars. Such occassions when William did wear Eton collars were always special events like having his photograph taken or attending a party. Going to dancing school was another such occassion. And of course it was worn on Sunday for Church. While William never wore his Eton collar to school, some of the drawings do show some of the other chaps, albeit a decided minority, wearing them. If the books had been set a decade earlier many more boys, including perhaps William himself, would have worn Eton collars.

Eton Suits

I do not recall William ever wearing an Eton suit. This corresponds to the actual fashion trends in England. The Eton suit was generally worn only by boys at Eton College or other public (exclusive private) school like Harrow that had a similar uniform. Some other boys may have worn Eton suits, but they would have mostly bennboys from wealthy families.

Eton Collars

The Eton collar was a very different matter. William like many other middle class and even working-class boys, did wear Eton collars William on many occassions donned an Eton collar which was usually sescribed as a "stiff" collar, to which he would object to mightly. This was particular common in the early books written in the 1920s. The Eton collar was still widely worn in the early 1920s, but rapidly declining in popularity as more and more boys wore soft collars. Such occassions when William did wear Eton collars were always special events like having his photograph taken or attending a party. Going to dancing school was another such occassion. And of course it was worn on Sunday for Church. While William never wore his Eton collar to school, some of the drawings do show some of the other chaps, albeit a decided minority, wearing them. If the books had been set a decade earlier many more boys, including perhaps William himself, would have worn Eton collars.


Figure 2.--Here William is seen dressed in an Eton collar to attend a tea party. The lady was his God Mother, in fact the woman for whom the above portrait was intended. William of course was not to pleased about having to attend the tea party.

Example

A typical example of one of these occassions is from "William and Photography," in William--The Fourth. This book was publisged in 1924.

William at the appointed hour, was in a state of suppressed fury. To William the lowest depth of humiliation was having his photograph taken. Mrs. Brown had expended much honest toil upon him. He had been washed and brushed and combed and manicured till his spirits had sunk below zero. To William, complete clanliness was quite incompatible with hapiness. He had been encased in his "best suit"--a thing of hard, unbending cloth; with that horror of horrors, a stiff collar.

"Won't a jersey do?" he had asked plaintively. "It'll probably make me ill--give me a sore throat or somethin'--this tight thing at my neck, an' I wouldn't like to be ill--'cause of gibing you trouble," he ended piously.

Mrs. Brown was touched--she was the one being in the world who never lost faith in William.

"But you wear it every Sunday, dear," she protested.

"Sunday is different," he said. Everyone wears silly things on Sunday--but, but s'pose I met someone on my way there." His horror was pathetic.

Well, you look very nice, dear. Where are your gloves?"

"Gloves?" he said indignantly.


Relevance

Crompton's stories are of course wonderfully embelished. They do, however, have an essential grain of truth about the nature of a typically mischevious small boy. They also rather acurately mirror boyhood fashions in the 1920s and 30s. As clothing was not infrequaently woven into the story lines, the books provide some insights into the fasgions of the day and how parents and boys looked at those fashions. We suspect that Williams' attitide toward the stiff Eton collars would have been echoed, perhaps not qite as vehemently or articulately, by many boys his age in the 1920s and 30s.





Christopher Wagner






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Created: April 6, 2002
Last updated: April 6, 2002