What's the difference?

[ufguy11]

This thread doesn't really have that much to do with hats, but this area of the fedoralounge is looked at most so I put it here. I've been wondering lately about the two big favorite decades of the lounge, the 30's and 40's. And the question I asked myself is, what's the big difference? The style of the car? Yes but not by much. The style of the hat? In my mind not really at all. The attitude of people? If you consider the depression I guess you could say so but in the late thirties it seems to me everyone was happy. Input?

J.J.

 

[BigSleep]

I'm no expert but fashion-wise:

The 30s tended to be middle of the road. Medium brims on hats medium lapels.

In the early 40s things changed a bit due to war rationing. Less cuffs on pants. Less vests. Less material all around. But after the war... Look out. Wide lapels and shoulders. Baggy pants. Wiiiide brims.

Seems that this trend lasted into the mid-to-late fifties when things began to trim down again. (remember Elvis in those early baggy pants and suit coats?)

Then in the Late 50s-early 60s things really got skinny. Closer cropped pants. (Think Sammy Davis with the Rat Pack) Stingy brims on the lids.

Of course then came the seventies and everything went crazy.

Every trend is a reaction to the trend before it.

I'm sure others on the forum can add to/correct this.

 

[Shaul-Ike Cohen]

The 30s tended to be middle of the road.

Er, or just right. As it should be.

 

[Rick Blaine]

Speaking for myself...

... both of my parents were born in the early 1930s & came to adulthood in the 40s and I don't think I had quite appreciated the extent to which I was shaped & molded by the period.

when my Da' had his mid life crisis in his 40s he became obsessed with collecting, trading & networking w/ others who collected classic radio shows on reel to reel tape. As a result I grew up listening to Fred Allen, Jack Benny, The Shadow, Lights Out, Edgar Bergen & Charlie McCarthy among others. So for me it is a sense of nostalgia for a time I never knew (yet did know... sort of) as well as a solid connection to my folks & the formative events & personalities that made them who they are...

 

[Mr. Rover]

Yes- that's precisely why I love the 30's stuff the most. They pretty much had it right the first time around.