Figure 1.--These boys wear almost identical short pants suits. The younger boy's jacket does not have pockets. The older boy has a hankerchief in his breast pocket and wears a bowtie. These do not appear, however, to be concessions sometimes made to the age of the older brother. Given the lenhth of the older brother's short pants, the suit appears to be new and meant to be worn for at least a year or two. |
Shortpants suits were not as popular in America as in Europe. Some American parents, however, believed like European parents that boys should wear short pants, especially for dress occassions. Some parents liked to dress all of the boys in identical suits. Sometimes the older brother might be allowed to war long pants. But parents had many different ideas about the age at which the older brother could wear long pants. Boys in the southern states might wear short pants longer than boys in the north or west. Some parents in the 1920s and 30s insisted on boys up to 13 or 14 wearing shorts. Other parents allowed the older brother to switch to long pants at an increasingly young age, especially by the 1960s. The older brother did not always appreciate being dressed like his younger brothers. Mothers often rather admired this look, but the older brother often objected as he got older. Some mothers would thus choose a style appropriate for the older son, while others preferred the style appropriate for the younger son. Other mothers would make adjustments recogmizing the age of the older son. But there were some mothers who insisted on dressing their sons in identical suits.
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