The above picture from the 1923 English FA Cup Final (between West Ham United and Bolton Wanderers) shows all but one man wearing a hat. And the hatless man had probably just removed his to scratch his head as the photo was being taken. So why did the vast majority of men stop wearing hats whenever they were outdoors?
HATS OFF! STAGE PROP TO STYLE ICON
No single milliner can claim to have designed the fedora. The felt hat took its name from Fédora, an 1882 play by playwright Victorien Sardou. Its star, Sarah Bernhardt, appeared as Princess Fédora wearing a center-creased, soft-brimmed hat.
Women first adopted the look as a symbol of modern independence.
By the 1920s, men had appropriated its design: lighter and less formal than a top hat, yet dressier than a cap.
Hollywood turned the fedora into an American uniform. Gangsters, detectives, newspapermen and leading men wore it on screen; Humphrey Bogart, Cary Grant and later Frank Sinatra gave it glamour, mystery and masculine authority.
It also suited an age when men walked, rode trains and dressed formally in public.
The fedora did not die in one dramatic moment.
After World War II, clothing became more casual, and some veterans disliked civilian hats after years of compulsory military headgear. Enclosed automobiles protected men from weather, while lower roofs made brimmed hats inconvenient.
By the 1960s, longer hairstyles and youth culture made the fedora seem like the uniform of fathers and bosses. The hat survived, but as baseball cap rather than a daily style requirement..
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