History of Scout Uniforms

[briantshore 14]

I have recently bought some old uniforms, but I was wondering how to estimate the age of them. On pair of pants was advertised from the 1950's. It is a heavy material, with 5 buttons in the fly. I would almost guess this would be thought to be a winter uniform if there was such a thing. Has anyone ever seen any book or other type of information to show how the boyscout uniform evolved. Any help would be wonderful.

[Kahuna 172]

There never was a winter uniform, per se, as far as I know (other than short pants and shirts vs long). If you have pants with button fly and heavy material, they probably date from the early forties rather than fifties. If they have a jodphur design, with buttons on the leg designed to be covered by socks, they definitely predate 1948. Scouts wore that uniform from about the mid twenties. Uniforms from that period had removeable metal buttons.

 

Before that, the uniform was modeled on the WWI Army uniform.

[briantshore 14]

Thanks Kahuna,

These are straight leg pants. They have the feal simualar to what I had in the Army that we called field pants, except no cargo pockets. They are not not wool, but almost a very heavy cotton. Thanks for the help.

[SueM 10]

briantshore,

 

My patrol did our Wood Badge project on the history of Uniforms in scouting...I actually have the project sitting here in my dining room as I used it for a display at BLT last weekend. Anyway..there is a WHOLE lot of information out there on the internet (which is where we got most of it for our project).

 

Long pants (as opposed to the laced jodhpurs) were introduced in 1944.