A primer on cowboy hats

Most everyone where I came from wore a cowboy felt hat with most of them being Stetsons. There were probably a few Resistols but not that many. A few wore hats made by professional hat makers like the hat maker in my home town of Arthur, Nebraska. I think he's retired now. In the cooler months, everyone wore a felt Stetson hat. Some wore these Stetsons no matter how cold it got and 20 to 30 below was common in Nebraska. Duane Wilson was one of them. He was tough. Most guys and gals I knew traded their hats for a good cap with ear muffs when it got cold. (I sure did!) Most wore a neckerchief around their neck, like John Jenson. Come summer some traded their felt Stetsons in on straw hats, but some never did. They just kept wearing those old sweaty felt Stetsons.

From the bottom of the hat going up the first thing is the brim. This is say 1/8 to 1/4 inch thick and extends out away from the wearer's head. The brim is usually circular in shape and can be most any width from as little as an inch or two up to 6 or 8 inches or even more. Just above the brim is the crown. It is the hollow part above the brim where the wearer's head sticks up into. The crown can be different heights from 4 to 5 inches tall to who knows. There was a western comedy on TV many years ago, and I'll bet his crown was over a foot tall.

The top of the crown is shaped and molded to give the crown and ultimately the hat some character. If there is a crease down the middle of the crown from front to back it's called the "crease". Now if there are indentations along both sides of the crease running along the side these are called the "pinch".

The brim can be shaped in many different ways, and many times the shape is kind of where the wearer lives or works or resides. The shape of the brim can also be based on a vocation or even the weather where worn. For many the brim is a shade from the sun, so if you are in a really sunny spot the brim will tend to be wider and shaped to add shade like the Vaqueros from the southwestern states. Cowboys who ride bucking horses in the rodeos hats are shaped different than the bull riders.

If the wearer is from the middle states, from say Nebraska to the Dakotas, the brim will be narrower, 3 to 5 inches rather than 5 to 10 inches for the brim in the Southwest. Sun isn't as fierce and doesn't get as hot, but it does rain more and tends to blow worse. So the sides of the brim are curved up and there is a narrowing toward the front of the hat. One place I saw advertised this style as a Nebraskan or Cattleman. The crown usually has a center crease and some pinch.

One that I like is a throwback to Tom Mix. The crown had a slight crease from the back sloping down in the front with two pinches. Mix had a pretty flat brim with a pencil curl along the edge. It's a nice looking hat. The hat's that John Wayne wore in many of his cowboy movies is a really nice hat. Brim is a 4- to 5-inch brim with curls along the edges angled from front to back. The crown has a slight crease and shallow pinches. The Quigley cowboy hat is a lot like the Tom Mix hat. Very similar. George Straight has about a 4-inch brim and crown has a cattleman shape. Center crease and pinches along both sides.

When we moved to Scott City in 1986, I wore my Levis and cowboy boots and Stetson. Since then I've traded my Levis for bib overalls, cowboy boots for shoes that are more comfortable where I'm diabetic and wore out my Stetson. There are times I miss the cowboy culture, but I do enjoy living around railroaders, river guys and just plain good Southeast Missourians.