Early Hats

[Pawnee Bill]

Pawnee Bill, if you don't have it the link to the collection is:

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/award98/nbhihtml/pshome.html

Pitspiter and I kind of like the whole collection, many are taken near his home and that is also my favorite place in the whole world.  Nice views with no durn mountians or trees to ruin the view.   

Del'
No I dodn't have that link
thank You.
Cheers
Pawnee Bill

[Ottawa Creek Bill]

The name needs to be changed to "The Broken Trail" hat.   For those who use Hollywood as a referance at least. Grin

Del,
I think I'll just rename them, the "Robert Duval Special(s)" In the enlargment, what do you think of the damage? Does it look like he may have snagged it (the area that looks like a tear of some kind), or just damaged it in a drunken stupor?? Inquiring minds want to know....

Bill

[Delmonico]

Sadly Bill, you like most others have forgotten that the Pinch Slope was called the Tom Horn before most even knew who Robert Duval was, nobody eved drives like Steve McQueen any more.

The hat on the stairs, Pitspiter's morter theroy is as good as any,  or steped on by a hoss or mule  The other hat, the good one, looks like someone who knew what they were doing shaped it.  Perhaps the western store at the mall in Grand Island, or perhaps they traveled all the way to Lincon to have that well know hat bender/cosie do it.    No guess not, the date is 1889.

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[Pawnee Bill]

Bill I think you can use the Butcher collection as primary documentation. Butcher's notes were extensive and I doubt the Smithsonian wouldn't be using them the way they are if they didn't consider them pretty authoritative.

Authoritative and definitive are really two different things!
 The problems with the dating of photographs are legion. Although I have not found that image in the photo bank yet many others in the collection are dated ca. . Another potential problem is although he is dating his own work when were the date assigned are the wet plates dated are the dates assigned many years after the fact etc. This would apply to any image one is trying to evaluate, that is why I wanted to look at the source documents.
 Just as an example a while back I was compiling some photos for some friends of early EoT’s and ran across this image in my collection

On the back of the image written in pencil not in my hand was the note EoT 85
 Figuring that could not be right I did some digging . The gloves were purchased at the Butterfield auction in March 88 so that would have to be no later than Apr. 88 , found the entry for when I obtained the hat it was at Winter range Feb 95. The backround looked like Coto de Caza the location of EoT but it moved in 95 to NORCO and the back round was not NORCO. This was driving me crazy . Upon further examination I concluded that the image was a scan of a print of a wet plate negative due to the ghosting stark quality of the whites. OK so I know two guys that do wet plates so I e-mailed the pic to them . The guy that took the pic wrote back and informed me that the pic was taken at Roaring Camp California in May 1995 as he had the negative and it was dated on the sight where it was taken. What dose all this mean well. This pic is less than 20 years old it was marked on the back and even with this so called dating the assigned date was 7 years off.
 Just kind of show how these things can go.
Cheers
Pawnee Bill

[Ottawa Creek Bill]

Sadly Bill, you like most others have forgotten that the Pinch Slope was called the Tom Horn before most even knew who Robert Duval

Del,
Well, no I haven't forgot as I've never called it the "Tom Horn", and thats not what it is called in my 1897 Sears, 1895 Montgomery Ward, or my 1886 Bloomingdales catalog.....Tom Horn is not mentioned in any of them ( ), so I don't think Ol Tom was getting any royalties for wearing a certain style of hat. On the other hand, I'll bet Ol Bobby Duval is getting his free........

As a matter of fact, the hat that looks like it the most is called the Sportsman's Hat (page 234)....at a $1.50, or the Govenor (page 233), at $2.00. These both appear to be hand shaped. The 1886 Bloomingdale's catalog doesn't show anything even remotely close to it.

Bill

[Ottawa Creek Bill]

Authoritative and definitive are really two different things!
 The problems with the dating of photographs are legion. Although I have not found that image in the photo bank yet many others in the collection are dated ca.

Pawnee.....
Exactly.........

Bill

[Delmonico]

There could be a few mistakes in Butcher's collection through the years, but it is far more accurate than any other from that date.  See Butcher not only took notes, when the collection was sold to NSHS in 1915, he helped with the cataloging.  Plus the fact almost all of it exists as the negatives makes it better.  His posing of items in the background to show them, but not center stage is a very valuble tool that sometimes drives one crazy. 

For fun, type crossbow into the search.  Then try to tell us why it is there.  I have my theroy.   And I doubt they went to Renny-saunce Fairs at the local vinyard.

[Pawnee Bill]

There could be a few mistakes in Butcher's collection through the years, but it is far more accurate than any other from that date.  See Butcher not only took notes, when the collection was sold to NSHS in 1915, he helped with the cataloging.  Plus the fact almost all of it exists as the negatives makes it better.  His posing of items in the background to show them, but not center stage is a very valuble tool that sometimes drives one crazy. 

For fun, type crossbow into the search.  Then try to tell us why it is there.  I have my theroy.   And I doubt they went to Renny-saunce Fairs at the local vinyard.

Del
 I still haven't been able to locate the image do you know what it is titled?.
 Thanl You
Pawnee Bill

[Delmonico]

Before Heading Out,   

It is the second picture, the first is a print made from the neagative, the second one is clearer.  The crossbow is on the roof.

The links in American Memory chance, for some security reason, a friend spend about two hours one day with the LOC folks, she explainded to me why, but I don't quite understand.

The Homepage for all the collections is

www.memory.loc.gov

The Denver Public Library Collecion is there ad one out of the Dakotas from just before and after 1900.  It has some great picks of Bonanza Farming if you like Steam Traction Engines and Early Internal Compustion Tractors.  There is one steamer pulling a 14 bottom plow in virgin prairie, those things send shivvers up my spine.  I coss paths with those folks from time to time'

There is a lot of Brady  photos in the collection also, plus some really good printed material.  When you get to the home page, click on "all collections."