Figure 1.--This English boy wears an elaborately styled sailor tunic suit. Not how mother ha insisted that he hold is arm so that the photograph shows the lace on the back flap of his tunic. He wears short pants under his tunic, American boys more commonly wore above the knee knickers with long stockings.

The sailor tunic is one style of tunic suit. Anfthey came in several diffrent styles. Some were very plain with virtually no styling except for the taditional V-collar and belt. A good example of a relatively plain suit is an unidentified English boy. Inj this case there was double-breasted styling. Others of these sailor tunics were trimmed with lace and ruffles (figure 1). These may appear to have been made for girls, but in fact they were boys' formal garments. A girls' formal garment would have been more likely have been a party frock. Most sailor tunics had the characteristic front 'v' cut sailor collar, A few informal suits had a square front collar. These were more popular in Europe than America. All had of the V-front sailor tuics duits hsad the accompsnying characteristic back flaps. Some of the black flaps were plain like a middy blouse, other fancy tunic suits may have lace trimmed or even large lace back flaps.

Created: January 30, 1999
Spell check: July 20, 1999
Last updated: 4:05 PM 3/9/2023