Cowboy hat
The cowboy hat is a high-crowned, wide-brimmed hat best known as the defining piece of attire for the North American cowboy. Today it is worn by many people, and is particularly associated with ranch workers in the western and southern United States, western Canada and northern Mexico, with many country, regional Mexican and sertanejo[a] music performers, and with participants in the North American rodeo circuit. It is recognized around the world as part of Old West apparel.
The cowboy hat as known today has many antecedents to its design, including Mexican hats such as the sombrero, the various designs of wide-brimmed hat worn by farmers and stockmen in the eastern United States, as well as the designs used by the United States Cavalry.
The first western model was the open-crowned "Boss of the Plains", and after that came the front-creased Carlsbad, destined to become "the" cowboy style.[1] The high-crowned, wide-brimmed, soft-felt western hats that followed are intimately associated with the cowboy image.[2]
Variations[edit]
Ten-gallon hats[edit]
Some cowboy hats have been called "ten-gallon" hats. The term came into use about 1925.[26] There are multiple theories for how the concept arose.
One theory is that the term "ten-gallon" is a corruption of the Spanish modifier tan galán, which loosely translates as "really handsome"[27] or "so fine". For example, "un sombrero tan galán" translates as "such a fine hat".
Another theory is that the term "ten-gallon" is a corruption of the Spanish term galón, which means "galloon", a type of narrow braided trim around the crown, possibly a style adapted by Spanish cowboys. When Texas cowboys misunderstood the word galón for "gallon", the popular, though incorrect, legend may have been born. According to Reynolds and Rand, "The term ten-gallon did not originally refer to the holding capacity of the hat, but to the width of a Mexican sombrero hatband, and is more closely related to this unit of measurement by the Spanish than to the water-holding capacity of a Stetson."[28]
Early print advertising by Stetson showed a cowboy giving his horse a drink of water from a hat.[29] The Stetson company notes that a "ten-gallon" hat (equivalent to 38 liters) only holds 3⁄4 US gallon (2.8 L).[28][30]
Calgary White Hat[edit]
The Calgary White Hat is a white felt cowboy hat which is the symbol of both the Calgary Stampede annual rodeo and the city of Calgary. Created by Morris Shumiatcher, owner of Smithbilt Hat Company, it was worn for the first time at the 1946 Stampede. In the early 1950s, Mayor of Calgary Donald Hugh Mackay began presenting the white hat to visiting dignitaries, a tradition that the office of the mayor continues to this day. Thousands of tourists and groups also participate in "white hatting ceremonies" conducted by Tourism Calgary and by volunteer greeters at the Calgary International Airport. In 1983, the Calgary White Hat was incorporated into the design of the flag of Calgary.[31]