Figure 1.--This American boy wears a fancy Fauntleroy blouse with his suit. While quite a fancy oufit, it is not a true Fauntleroy suit. Note that the suit has some elements of sailor styling with a back flap. HBC estimates that the portrait was taken about 1890. |
Perhaps the style most associated with ringlet cirls is the Fauntleroy suit. Large numbers of American boys wore their fancy Fauntleroy suits with ringlet curls. This included both actual formal Little Lord Fauntleroy suits and a variery of other suits with Fauntleroy styling. Despite the association, however, most boys who wore Fauntleoy suits did not have the added indiginy to bear of also wearng ringlets. Based on the available photographic record, HBC estimates thar the number of boys wearing ringlets with Fauntleroy suits was 10-20 percent with the percentage falling for the older boys.
Boys in the late 19th and early 20th century wore a variety of fancy suits. The best known is of course the Fauntleroy suit. But only some of these fancy suits were formal Fauntleroy suits. We note boys wuith ringlet curls wearing quite a wide range of these fancy suits.
Perhaps the style most associated with ringlet cirls is the Fauntleroy suit. There were a variety of Fauntleroy outfits. The best known were Fauntleroy suits with kneepants. Other Fautleroy suits consisted of kilts rather than kneepants. This was a form of kilt suits which many boys wore in the late 19th century. Large numbers of American boys wore their fancy Fauntleroy suits with ringlet curls. Actual Faunteloy suits were black or other dark colored velvet suits. Fauntleroy suits went through a variety of stylistic changes. Initially with small jackets worn with fancy blouses with elaboprate lace and ruffled trim. The jackets were worn open to reveal the fancy blouse. Later Fauntleroy jackets were worn larger, covering all but the collar and cuffs. Here we see Albert Welles Ristine who was photographed in Ft. Dodge, Iowa during April 1884. Like many boys at the time, he wears his Fauntleroy suit with ringlet curls. Note that this was before Mrs. Burnett wrote her famous book, "Little Lord Fauntleroy". It is a good example how Mrs. Burnett did mot create the style, but she certainly popularized it as the "Fauntleroy Craze" swept the country.
Many boys worn ringlets with a variety of suits with Fauntleroy styling and worn with elaborate Fauntleroy blouses, but were not actual formal Fauntleroy suits. There were many variations. The most common were suits made of other material than velvet. Winter suits might be made of serge. Summer suits might be made of linnen. Often the jackets had non Fauntleroy styling. The most common vaiation was to introduce elements of sailor suit styling. The materials anf stying, however, was highly varied. The elements of trim were also highly varied. Many of these suits, despite the difference wityh actual formal Fauntleroy suits, were actually referred to as Fauntleroy suits by contemprary sources.
Despite the association with Fauntleroy suits, most boys who wore Fauntleoy suits did not have the added indiginy to bear of also wearng ringlets. Based on the available photographic record, HBC estimates thar the number of boys wearing ringlets with Fauntleroy suits was 10-20 percent with the percentage falling for the older boys. This estimate is, however, still very tentative.
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