Was anyone else as mystified by this hat as I was? What is it? Brim turned up like a cuff? Crown looking like a stocking cap pulled down over the end of a cow's legbone? What exactly is this creature trying to tell us? I could never concentrate on enjoying a Goofy cartoon because I was so distracted by whatever it is that he's wearing on his head.
It's a chef's hat, at least in cartoon world, where anything's possible, it remains on Goofy's head. You should see the actor at Disney, Florida. The actor(s) wear a massive plastic head, complete with comic hat. It takes some balancing.
I never questioned it as a kid; nowadays, I assume it was some sort of cut-down fedora like Jughead and other characters wore: https://www.thefedoralounge.com/threads/what-the-heck-does-jughead-wear.29067/
Actually, I think as a kid I just assumed it was some sort of top hat as they were pretty fancy dress by then?
Yeah, this hat always mystified me, too. I always supposed it was supposed to be a fedora of some sort, but just a cartoon version unique to this character (yeah, I was that literal kid). But I didn't really take to Goofy, as the character, as well as the hat (and that voice - oy!), annoyed me. And I was a WB LT/MM fan, anyway - never got excited about Disney animation.
According to Wikipedia (yeah, I know): "Goofy is a tall, anthropomorphic dog with a Southern drawl, and typically wears a turtle neck and vest, with pants, shoes, white gloves, and a tall hat originally designed as a rumpled fedora."
I can see the Fedora Police now, rushing to measure the width of his hatband and the depth of his dent. Besides, everyone knows white gloves are properly worn only with a derby.
See, that's the thing that weirded me out. Goofy is a dog, but treated like a human. Pluto is a dog, but he's Mickey's pet. As bizarro as Rupert Bear world....
The hat never really got my attention, but Goofy's old truck had all of the patches on the outside of the bald tires he drove around on. Even my small self thought that was ridiculous. Didn't anybody know how to patch a tire properly?
All my hats are 30's to 60's. I have some nice homburgs and bowlers I wear on certain occasions but I always have on a fedora or trilby and I couldn't care less if someone thinks I'm not "pulling off the look".
And I think that if one has that attitude then the hat, or whatever the garment in question is, looks like it belongs, and is noticed that way by (most) others.
I used to wonder why Pluto was different from goofy but then again Disney released this comic at one point