How Kennedy Did Not Kill the Hat

            Humans have been covering their heads for millions of years, originally with animal skin for protection against the elements. But by the time hats made their way into popular American culture the purpose of head covering had expanded to include a means to communicate military affiliation, nationality, religious affiliation, financial status, social status, and class. Hats quickly began to take hold in American culture, a fact that is apparent and well documented  in paintings and literature of late 1800s, and again in photos and films captured later in the mid and late 1900s. American men wore hats at functions, restaurants, outdoors, and on the way to work. As a matter of fact, hats were so much a part of the American man’s identity that police mug shots had to include a photo with a hat, and one without, to capture the true visual identity, personality, and likeness of an individual. But today that trend seems to have faded to nothing but a thin trail, a trail that leads to a not-so-clear series of events, spanning from the late twenties to the seventies, it is a crime-scene era when something or someone killed the hat. And like any other crime-scene investigation, one must study the timeline leading to the event.

          As an exhibit in the investigation, to better visualize the rise and sudden demise of the hat, one can look at the hat industry in Danbury, Connecticut, popularly known as the Hat City of America. The town of Danbury was officially incorporated in 1702 and in 1780 the first hat factory was established by Zadoc Benedict. The factory had only three employees and produced about 18 hats per week. Several large hat factories emerged by 1880 and the city’s production reached a whopping 4.5 million hats annually. By 1904 the town of Danbury produced 24 percent of all the hats purchased in the United States. But in 1920s the hat industry began to see decline, and by 1950 the hat industry in Danbury was desperately trying to revive the trend by orchestrating town parades, such as the Hatter’s Day Parade, or even advertising on popular magazines such as The News-Times, urging readers to “[w]ear a hat—keep your neighbor working.” By mid-1950s the industry had had its great fall, and neither The Hat Institute nor the Hat Research Foundation could put the hat industry together again.

          So what really happened to the hat? An untraceable popular legend has it that Kennedy killed the hat. The assumption is based on the rumor that John F. Kennedy was the first celebrated official to not wear a hat during his inaugural address. And being a very popular American idol, men began to follow in his footsteps. And even though Kennedy rarely wore hats in public, consequently setting a trend for other men in his administration to appear hatless, there is no reason to believe he was the original cause of this decline in popularity of hats. Further investigation reveals that even though he may have taken his hat off before his speech, he did wear it all the way to the podium. Something a few other presidents before him did, since immediately after the speech they were required to take their hats off and swear on the Bible. This made for an awkward moment of presidents needing an assistant to hold the hat for them, or looking around for a place to set them, while they took the oath of office. Moreover, a post-hat hair-do is not always pleasing to the sight, and with the advent of cameras, it didn’t make for very pleasing inaugural photographs. So, there is no real connection between the Kennedy inaugural speech and the death of the hat. Not to mention that the hat was standing on its last legs in the fifties and Kenney was not inaugurated until 1961. As a matter of fact, no one reason points to the demise of the once-popular insignia and the plot of this real life murder mystery resembles more that of Murder On the Orient Express. There seems to be several culprits in this case which include cars, a fluid class system, shampoo, TV, fashion, and the sixties.

        The Federal Aid Road Act of 1916 followed by the Federal Aid Highway act of 1921 built 31000 miles of paved road in the United States that made cars more practical for the average American. This change in the means of travel as opposed to travelling on foot or on a bicycle reduced exposure to elements and reduced incentive for the use of the hat. Later, during the Second World War the US government heavily invested in car manufacturers, expanding their factories and subsidizing their technological advancements to aid with the war effort. That increase in production capacity coupled with the post-war Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956 introduced by the then-president Dwight David “Ike” Eisenhower who built the US Interstate Freeway system, made cars a more sought-after means of transportation than foot, bicycles, trains, and trolleys put together. Cars contributed to the demise of hats in a few ways. One reason was the shortage of head space in cars in contrast to other means of transportation. As Robert Krulwich mentions in his article on NPR, “After Eisenhower they [Americans] used a car. That, my father thinks, created the critical Head-To-Roof difference.” The average hat of the time increased a person’s height by 3 to 18 inches, which was not a problem in a train or a trolley, but cars rarely afforded that kind of head room. Later the common use of head rests on car seats, which pressed against the hat, and the lack of place to rest the hat in cars further made hats a nuisance for car owners. So if there is a president to share any part of the blame for killing the hat, it would be Ike Eisenhower.

         This growth in the car industry and the availability of adequate road systems contributed to a rapid urbanization of America, as cities expanded to connect to the Interstate system and workers could choose to work where the jobs were plentiful, namely large cities. This change in the way of life also changed the way Americans viewed class, status, and identity. The average American no longer followed the footsteps of his father into the family trade. This created a more fluid class system and with that died the desire to identify one’s profession or family status by the means of insignia, such as the hat.

         With this urbanization, came jobs that allowed the average American access to television sets. Americans incorporated watching movies, in the comfort of their living rooms, as part of their recreational activities. This fact had an indirect effect on the popularity of hats. Film technology was not yet as advanced as today, and shades from hats blocked a good view of actors’ faces. Hence many directors limited the use of hats in movies to only when it was necessary. Another reason for the lack of hats in movies was the fact that the majority of movies were being produced in the coastal cities of California, such as Hollywood, where the hair requires much less protection from the elements. This introduction of hatless Hollywood culture began to seep into the American consciousness. Soon the TV contributed to the shifting of fashion from colder, gloomier places like New York to warmer more casual places like California; at least it did so for the average person in love with his TV.  And improvements in the quality of shampoo products in the fifties, which made cleaning of hair on a regular base much more convenient, left no obstacles in the way of the new American man practicing his newly found passion for hair styles.          

         Many would argue that the final nail in the coffin for the hat industry came in the 1960s, when a social and cultural movement swept across the globe, and this movement was nowhere as loudly pronounced as in the United States. In America the movement took the shape of a struggle for racial equality, class equality, individual liberties, and proper representation of the average American around the political, cultural, and social roundtable of the time. Americans blamed the good-old-boy mentality of the past for the under-representation of the majority and they expressed it by distancing themselves from all things traditional in all aspects possible, including fashion. The white male with a tie, suit, and a hat image, “the man”, became the poster child for the very abuse of power the people protested. And as the good-old-boys became rapidly unpopular, so did their hats.

         Today an occasional cap representing a person’s sport team or a place of employment is all that remains of the rigorous and vibrant hat culture of old America. And as the investigation reveals, culprits were plenty in the murder of the hat, but President Kennedy was not one of them.