My first trip to Brooks was at about 9 years old, or so, IIRC.  I wanted this crazy-colored item, and I had to save up my money to get it.  Because it wasn't something "practical" for a child my age.

From Mr. Manton on SF, previously on AAAC:


"In California, not so very long ago, or at least in certain parts (up north, mostly), "trad" (or whatever we wish to call it now) was the expected way for men to dress. This was certainly true in my family, and among the friends and associates of my parents and extended family. We fit the "trad" demographic not at all, not by even a single criterion. I don't recall even being aware, at the time, that there was anything regional or class-based or "Ivy league" about this way of dressing. Yet I never questioned that this was the ONLY way to dress. It was the AMERICAN way to dress. It was the way my father, grandfathers, uncles and seemingly everyone else dressed.

Shirts were oxford cloth button-downs. THE dress shoe was a cordovan wing-tip; second, a tassel loafer; third a penny loafer. Throw in dirty bucks, and your feet were covered. Alden or J&M. Ties came from Robert Talbott of Carmel, long before they went Italian and seven-fold: all repp stripes (right over left, the American way) and neat prints. Everyone had a blazer, a three-roll-two sack. When you got your first suit, it was the same model, but in solid gray. Pleated dress pants were considered anathema, as I discovered after I saw them on a TV character and asked my mother to buy some for me; she refused. Etc. There were even little trad haberdashers in most of the college towns. In college, day-to-day, the guys dressed like slobs. For any occasion that required a tie, we were pretty much all trad.

Keep in mind that I am talking about business and otherwise "dressy" clothes here. Casual clothes were much more subject to the whims of fashion. There were no Natucket reds or anything like that, that I can recall. Yet even with respect to casual clothes, the preppy look (dumbed down, I suppose) was widely seen. I believe the first time I heard the term "preppy" was when I saw Lisa Birnbach interviewed by Jane Pauley on the Today Show. I never owned the book, but it was very popular with some, especially teenage girls.

Why this should have been so, I don't know. In looking back, the best explanation I can conjour up is that we were all aping (the older ones more conciously, the rest of us unconciously or unknowingly) the old San Francisco upper class, which was at the time breathing its last heady breaths as California's almost hereditary ruling elite. (Old joke: Members of the Jonathan Club run California; members of the California Club own California; members of the Pacific Union Club ARE California.) Old San Francisco society and the business community were extremely trad. So much so that, in 1977, Molloy wrote in Dress for Success that the dress codes for San Francisco and Boston were identical. I think he got that right. Time was, you could have shot the entire Brooks catalouge in four locations: the corner of California and Montgomery, the Pac Union Club, the St. Francis Yacht Club, and the Olympic Club.

The other influence, I think, was the huge contingent of Ivy Leaguers and Northeasterners who ended up on the faculty and in the administration at Stanford and especially at Berkeley and set the cultural, social, and sartorial tone for those places. They were respected back in the day, and their influence rippled outward. That, and the students took their style home with them.

Things were different down south, however. There was, and is, a trad contingent in Pasadena, San Marino, and (less and less) Hancock Park. But downtown and on the West Side, anything goes (and went). I remember the first time a family member had to do some major business down there. He partnered up with one of those monster downtown L.A. firms. His associate wore nothing but Hermes ties and Italian suits. Confidence in the trad was shaken. Envy slithered into the garden."


^ I like that. 'Just clothes' for him back then. A nice post.

J.

Some more from my uncle....

"Shooting yes, we just called it hunting, usually for pheasant or quail. We did have a spaniel but he was never trained for hunting and retrieving. Not to be shy asking questions, better to ask a stupid question than to do something stupid. You learned to swim at the beach? I always thought swimming in the ocean difficult. I guess subconsciously I always liked swimming with the guys at the club. My dad belonged to a Catholic men’s club and sometimes he would take me along. This is where he taught me to swim and I learned 'dirty' words from the guys telling jokes in the steam room. He explained later when I would ask, Dad what does c*cksucker mean? I mostly went to a catholic club for boys/teenagers run by friars. Dad didn't go there but would drop my friends and me off for an afternoon or something. Strictly enforced rules there, not like my dad's club where the adults seemed to do all the things they weren't allowed to as kids. Haha, you've made me remember things I haven't thought about for a long time.

Trad lifestyle or just living?  he is one of the few guys i know who only puts on as a joke.

^ I can only assume all accountants and actuarials are middle class, hence their obsession with measuring and quantifying everything.

A bit more....

Friday night i pressed uncle about his past asking about certain storied and asking to see some pictures.  Sure enough he has photo albums.  lots of family photos which i had never seen.  He gave me some pictures becaue i have none.  Lots of photos from holidays and vacations with everyone wearing madras and seersucker, my favorite are the fourth of July photos.  they used to have a big party play croquet and tennis and yes there was a time when people actually wore all white to do such things.  they were a kinda shabby lot though, the old lawn furniture and castiron garden urns all needed painting and everyones clothes were wrinkled.  god they even had a maid in uniform.  other pictures were just as cool.  its like Ralph Lauren turned all shabby wrinkled with drinks and cigarettes in hand.  Funny to see pictures of my mom and uncle as teenagers.  GF said I look like my young uncle.  I took that as a compliment