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Friday 15 June 2018

An Array of Hats : Sepia Saturday

I was torn between Groups and Hats for my response to this week's Sepia Saturday prompt photograph below, but most of my groups are wedding photographs, so instead I decided to present you with   "An Array of Hats" .  They date from the early 20th century and reflect the range of ages as in the prompt picture. 



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Here is a charming photograph of the marriage of Beatrice Oldham and Jack Clark in Blackpool, Lancashire  on 26th December 1919. 

I feel the significance of the date after the First World War is not lost in this photograph,  where there is a certain air of informality and lack of ostentation,  with a plain hat and a shorter skirt and the groom carrying a trilby hat.   It contrasts with the very formal opulent dress style  at  Beatrice's sister Sarah's wedding nine years earlier in 1910.
   
Sarah and Beatrice were  the aunts of my mother's second cousin Elsie Oldham.   Sarah's husband George worked for the Oldham family coal merchant business in Blackpool. 

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But to return to everyday fashion wear in hats|:

My husband's great aunt Pat King, nee Hibbert, on the beach with her little daughter Annette, born in 1919. 

 
The formal engagement photograph of my husband's parents Ivy White and John Robert Donaldson of South Shields, County Durham.  They married in 1929. 


My mother Kathleen Danson, c.1911 taking part in a parade in Poulton-le-Fylde, Lancashire.  She does not look too happy in her little bootees, frilly white dress and large hat. 


A very fancy large hat for a little girl - Florence Mason. c.1905, pictured here with her father.   She was my grandfather's cousin on his mother's side of the family, and the youngest of twelve  children, six of whom were born in Brooklyn, New York.   

    
A photograph in the collection of my Great Aunt Jenny, and presumed to be a friend's daughter. 

And finally - combining hats and a group - another photograph from Jennie's collection -  - unfortunately unidentified, c.1920's.   But the group of friends look  
rather glum.




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Sepia Saturday give bloggers an opportunity 
to share their family history through photographs

CLICK  HERE TO SEE HOW OTHER SEPIA SATURDAY BLOGGERS 
HAVE TAKEN UP THIS WEEK'S THEME 



8 comments:

  1. I think these hats are gorgeous and it's a shame we've stopped watching them.

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  2. That's quite a collection of hats! The little daughter of a friend holding her teddy is beyond adorable! :)

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  3. Quite a selection of hat photos! Your husband's mother's hat and the little white hat on the daughter of Great Aunt Jenny are my favorites.

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  4. Too bad the millinery profession has disappeared. Although I’m grateful we don’t wear them anymore. I feel for your mother at the parade.

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  5. A very interesting array of hats. I always discover new useful clues from your dated photos on how to estimate the time frame of unmarked photos and postcards. The one female hat trend that still mystifies me is the brimless helmet fashion of the 1920-30s which seems like an abrupt change from the wide flat brims and floral hats of the 1900-1919s. I suspect it was brought on by both the influence of magazines/newspaper reports on film stars and the new fashion for shorter hair styles.

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  6. I hope that gloomy group was trying to look gloomy and didn't actually feel so gloomy!

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  7. I thought there was something wrong with my comments folder, as unusually I was not getting any responses to,this post . It was only today, I checked my Comments Awaiting Moderation, and for some reason, they were all there. I was delighted to see them, so thank you all.

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