Clothing & Accessories - Overview
Work, play, fashion, economic class, religious faith, even politics—all these aspects of American life and more are woven into clothing. The Museum cares for one of the nation's foremost collections of men's, women's, and children's garments and accessories—from wedding gowns and military uniforms to Halloween costumes and bathing suits.
The collections include work uniforms, academic gowns, clothing of presidents and first ladies, T-shirts bearing protest slogans, and a clean-room "bunny suit" from a manufacturer of computer microchips. Beyond garments, the collections encompass jewelry, handbags, hair dryers, dress forms, hatboxes, suitcases, salesmen's samples, and thousands of fashion prints, photographs, and original illustrations. The more than 30,000 artifacts here represent the changing appearance of Americans from the 1700s to the present day.
"Clothing & Accessories - Overview" showing 4 items.
Railroad Watch
- Description
- This English watch was a part of a technical fix applied to U.S. railroads following accidents in the middle of the 19th century.
- Back then timetables governed train arrivals and departures, established train priorities, and ensured that trains did not collide on single-track lines. Clocks in railroad stations and watches held by conductors and engineers helped to enforce the timetables.
- But in the middle of the 19th century, timepieces in use on the railroads varied wildly in quality and availability to employees of the line. There was no single standard of quality for railroad timekeepers. After a horrific fatal accident on the Providence & Worcester Railroad in August 1853, caused in part by the inaccuracy of a conductor's watch, some railroads in New England responded to public criticism of their industry by tightening up running rules and ordering top-quality clocks and watches for their employees.
- This is one such high-quality railroad watch.
- An official representing the Vermont Central Railroad and three other New England lines, William Raymond Lee, ordered watches and clocks in late 1853 from William Bond & Sons, Boston, the American agent for Barraud & Lund of London. The English firm delivered the first of the timepieces in January 1855. The Vermont Central purchased fifteen watches for $150 each and one clock for $300.
- Barraud & Lund, founded in 1750 by Huguenot watchmaker Francis-Gabriel Barraud, had a long-standing reputation for high-quality timepieces, including marine chronometers, clocks and watches. By the middle of the nineteenth century, the firm had extensive foreign markets and added John Richard Lund, a chronometer maker, to their business.
- William Bond & Son, the firm named on the watch's dust cap, was one of the principal timepiece purveyors of nineteenth-century America. Intimately connected to navigation and commercial shipping, the firm rated and repaired marine chronometers for the busy port of Boston and supplied instruments of all sorts to agencies of the federal government-specifically, the coast survey, the topographical engineers, and the navy. The firm, whose original business provided time for navigating at sea, branched out with the railroad business to perform the same service on land.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- Date made
- 1853
- maker
- Barraud & Lund
- ID Number
- 1999.0278.01
- catalog number
- 1999.0278.01
- accession number
- 1999.0278
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Fire Helmet, "Stockton 2 W.M.H."
- Description
- The traditional American leather firefighter’s helmet with its distinctive long rear brim, frontpiece, and crest adornment was first developed around 1821-1836 in New York City. Henry T. Gratacap, a New York City luggage maker by trade, is often credited as the developer of this style of fire helmet. Gratacap created a specially treated leather helmet with a segmented “comb” design that led to unparalleled durability and strength. The elongated rear brim (also known as a duckbill or beavertail) and frontpiece were 19th century innovations that remain the most identifiable feature of firefighter’s helmets. The body of the helmet was primarily designed to deflect falling debris, the rear brim prevented water from running down firefighters’ backs, and their sturdy crowns could aid, if necessary, in breaking windows.
- This black leather fire helmet dates to the mid-19th century. The helmet has eight combs, an embossed ivy-vine design around the brim, and a metal eagle frontpiece holder mounted to the crown of the helmet. The grey frontpiece reads “STOCKTON/2/WMH.’
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1855
- maker
- unknown
- ID Number
- 2005.0233.0192
- accession number
- 2005.0233
- catalog number
- 2005.0233.0192
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Fire Helmet, "John N. Bird R.F.D."
- Description
- The traditional American leather firefighter’s helmet with its distinctive long rear brim, frontpiece, and crest adornment was first developed around 1821-1836 in New York City. Henry T. Gratacap, a New York City luggage maker by trade, is often credited as the developer of this style of fire helmet. Gratacap created a specially treated leather helmet with a segmented “comb” design that led to unparalleled durability and strength. The elongated rear brim (also known as a duckbill or beavertail) and frontpiece were 19th century innovations that remain the most identifiable feature of firefighter’s helmets. The body of the helmet was primarily designed to deflect falling debris, the rear brim prevented water from running down firefighters’ backs, and their sturdy crowns could aid, if necessary, in breaking windows.
- This leather fire helmet made by an unknown American manufacturer dates from the mid-19th century. The helmet has eight combs with an embossed ivy-vine scrollwork design around the hat’s brim, and a metal eagle frontpiece holder. The frontpiece reads “JOHN BIRD/5/RFD.”
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1855
- user
- Bird, John N.
- maker
- unknown
- ID Number
- 2005.0233.0166
- accession number
- 2005.0233
- catalog number
- 2005.0233.0166
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Married
- Description
- Sentimental genre prints documented the social image of Victorian virtue through domestic scenes of courtship, family, home life, and images of the “genteel female.” Children are depicted studying nature or caring for their obedient pets as they learn their place in the greater world. Romantic scenes picture devoted husbands with their contented, dutiful wives. In these prints, young women educated in reading, music, needlework, the arts, the language of flowers, basic math and science are subjugated to their family’s needs.
- These prints became popular as lithography was introduced to 19th Century Americans. As a new art form, it was affordable for the masses and provided a means to share visual information by crossing the barriers of race, class and language. Sentimental prints encouraged the artistic endeavors of schoolgirls and promoted the ambitions of amateur artists, while serving as both moral instruction and home or business decoration. They are a pictorial record of our romanticized past.
- This hand colored print is an interior scene of a family of five seated in the parlor. The father is seated on an ornate red upolstered sofa, his young son leaning against his knee holding a ball or piece of fruit, perhaps an apple. An infant sits in the mother's lap, while the eldest child, a daughter stands alongside the mother, entertaining the baby with her doll. The mother is seated in an upholstered red chair. Heavy drapes, a partial view of a landscape picture in a fancy frame, a patterned rug and foot pillow on floor complete this domestic scene. The couple gaze at each other and compositionally depict a balanced and equal family unit. This is one of several prints with the same title, depicting a contented family. These happy family scenes were meant to contrast with the restless, discontented bachelor prints.
- This print was produced by the lithographic firm of Kelloggs & Comstock. In 1848, John Chenevard Comstock developed a partnership with E.B. and E.C. Kellogg. In 1850, Edmund Burke Kellogg left the firm, leaving his brother Elijah Chapman Kellogg and J.C. Comstock to run the lithography firm as Kellogg and Comstock. The short-lived partnership disbanded in 1851. It was not until 1855 that Edmund Burke Kellogg rejoined his brother E.C. Kellogg and continued the success of the family’s Lithography firm.
- date made
- 1850
- distributors
- Ensign, Thayer and Company
- maker
- Kelloggs & Comstock
- ID Number
- DL*60.2261
- catalog number
- 60.2261
- accession number
- 228146
- maker number
- 266
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center