Two very different hats
Today we have two very different hats – a man’s slouch and a woman’s pill box. Let’s take a closer look.
A crooked man
I’m reminded of a bit of whimsy, the nursery rhyme dated back the King Charles I of England (1600-1649), but only because this dude’s picture is crooked in the book.
There was a crooked man, and he walked a crooked mile.
He found a crooked sixpence upon a crooked stile.
He bought a crooked cat, which caught a crooked mouse,
And they all lived together in a little crooked house.
I played around with the photo a bit, just to see what I could do, and the result is a much straighter image.
Sit up, man!
It is much easier to appreciate the image now that it is straightened! I love his slouch hat, cocked a bit in the brim. I like to imagine the brim became creased there due to his constantly tipping his hat to the ladies. The lovely, full mustache is so “manly man” it makes me wonder if he was considered to be dashing by the ladies of his time. He’s got a nice strong jawline too, deep eyes, straight nose….ah, sigh…. :-) The coat over the patterned vest, the bow tie and velvet lapels, all make me think this man was the catch of the town.
Was this his lady?
This fine Miss has quite a fashionable hat. It appears to be velvet, although from what we now know of wet plate photography, it is unlikely it was black!
Uncredited but not mine
A Facebook acquaintance had this on their page, and while I asked for credit information I didn’t get it. So, I can’t tell you where it came from, but I would if I could. SO HELPFUL! You can see that black, brown,red, yellow and green all photograph as nearly black, whereas blue, purple and pink photograph as nearly white. I’m no photographer, so I can’t explain the reasons why this happened, but it does reveal to us that the hat may have been yellow and the dress blue!
There are only a couple more pages in this book, and then I have some fun CDVs to show you. Stick around for more!
Who Were They? 