Real Cowboy Hat

[29aholic]

Joe in texas is right. I wear a straw hat in the warm months and save my felt for the winter. I bought a used Resistol 30X Silverbelly at a gun show for $40. I bought a new Resistol George Strait straw hat off ebay for $26 brand new. I needed a black hat for a wedding and bought a 30X from The Boot Jack in Texas for about $200. It's an inhouse brand, but every bit as nice as my Resistol.

 

[bmbroker]

I grew up wearing hats year round. I only wear straws in the summer anymore because of the sun. The rest of the year its caps for me. I suggest you try a straw and decide if you're a hat guy. As posted previously, you can get a pretty decent straw for under $50. I'm currently wearing a panama straw made by Atwood. I think it cost around $35. I lost my favorite a few years ago in a boating accident in Cancun (it blew of my head and sunk before I could turn the boat around). I still miss it, and it cost me $12.

 

[imjin138]

I have a silver belly Stetson called the "Duke" I bought it from US CAV store while in Berlin wore it all the time. I had one long haired American at a train stop tell me "good job fitting in" I replied just like my high and tight and birth control glasses, if the Germans didn't already know i was a GI they were really slow.

On my way through the airport in Frankfurt I had a 4 handgun gun case and a Polizi escort, the customs lady asked me only 2 questions "is that a real Stetson, and is there really a pictire of a cowboy letting his horse drink from his hat on the inside and I replied yes to both and let her hold it and look inside the hat.

 

[Out West]

You know by now it isn't going to be cheap. If you want the real deal, try Peter Brothers in Fort Worth. You can buy factory, or you can go custom. Check them out here: Borsalino hats, scala hats, dobbs hats, resistol hats, stetson cowboy hats, stetson hats.

Out
West

 

[slowburninsteve]

Re-Built Cowboy Hat

I got out the above mentioned re-built cowboy hat of mine. It was re-built by Paris Hatters, 119 North Broadway, San Antonio, TX 78205. Here's some photos. Wish I had taken some "before" photos. I added the blingy hatband later.

 

[Old Corp]

I LIKE cowboy/Western hats. I'd like to wear one. I picked out a nice straw model at a Farm & Ranch Store in Sweetwater, Tx. about 20 years ago.
It just doesn't look right. For me, it's geographically wrong. And I've never thought they looked right wearing any sort of eyeglasses, especially sunglasses. I think Richard Petty looks ridiculous.
I spend hot NC Summers in shorts and cape-back fishing shirts and Keen-brand sandals. A cowboy hat of any quality would look like something out of the Village People.
I've tried them in the Fall and Winter - a little better, but without Western boots, it's still wrong.

As an off-duty officer, I worked many music concerts - 'Brooks & Dunn', Hank Williams Jr., and host of others. The 'fan base' was mostly into some sort of Western apparel - in fact you could tell what type of Western apparel WalMart was carrying by walking through the crowd. (why would you wear tight, black Levi's and dark, pearl-snap long sleeve shirts and a felt/beaver hat to an outdoor concert on evenings where its 90+ degrees and 95% humidity?)

Again, geographically and culturally, it was just odd-looking.

I'm jealous of you Western guys and good beaver hats, and I'll continue to envy you as I catch 50 lb. Drum in the Pamlico Sound this coming week wearing my boonie hat.

 

[broknaxl]

That's a good looking hat with a lot of sentiment connected with it. My favorite isn't an expensive big name traditionally cowboy hat. Around 1978 a girlfriend bought me a standard brown cowboy hat. My dad liked it so i gave it to him a couple years after that. He shaped it to his tastes. He wore it hunting for years and now it's all cool crusty and sweat stained and wears a Winnamucca rattle snake band my late big sister made from a snake her husband killed on their little desert spread around 1980. My dad gave it back to me a few years before he died. That's why it's my favorite. About your dad's cigarette smoke on it. I have a small rifle safe I bought brand new with a few rifles in it that were my dad's. When I open it I smell his cigar smoke. It must have stuck to the wood. It's a great feeling smelling that reminder of him. BTW. You don't look lit in that picture!

Hey, Wyatt I had a hat that could have been that ones twin. (minus the rattlesnake band). I bought it at WALL DRUGS in South Dakota on the way to Wyoming on a huntin' trip back in the late 70s. While in huntin' camp sittin' around the campfire one nite the cowboy guides are discussing their hats. I say I only paid $20.00 for mine. The one guy just glanced up and says It looks like it. Then nothing else was said. I still wore it for several years, it kept the rain, snow and sun off me many times. I do have a Resistol silver belly and a stetson straw. I wear this on and off.
(yeah, I lurk around here too!) See ya at that other forum.

 

[keith44spl]

Jimmy,

All these hats and not Smith in site...*G*





Till Now,

Su Amigo,
Dave

 

[feralmerril]

My nephew matt had a mental problem and I kinda wuz his keeper. He always wanted to be a cowboy. A western clothing store was going out of business and I bought this Tom Mix Stetson. Theresa took this picture of me giveing it to matt. Matt died about a year later on my watch. I took the hat back. It did look better on him than it does me!

 

[feralmerril]

I dont have many any good pictures handy of me wearing hats. However I somehow accumilated about 6 beaver mostly stetsons, and two straw.
I have one each by charlie one horse, and one handmade for me from a guy at a gunshow I bought on a whim. He claimed he made them for tom sellick and kevin costners movies and others. I belive don williams and that famous race driver, dale earnheart wore identical ones. Gotta get theresa to take more pictures.

 

[slowburninsteve]

My nephew matt had a mental problem and I kinda wuz his keeper. He always wanted to be a cowboy. A western clothing store was going out of business and I bought this Tom Mix Stetson. Theresa took this picture of me giveing it to matt. Matt died about a year later on my watch. I took the hat back. It did look better on him than it does me!

Matt sure did look happy. That was mighty nice of you to take such an interest in your nephew. I'm sure it made his day!
Steve

 

[Airpark]

Used to go from MS to MT every year. Always stopped in the Stetson Plant Store in St Joseph, MO on east side of I-29 on Stetson Road (816-233-8031) wound up with 8 of them that I wear from time to time. Favorite is the Merced Style which they no longer make.

Interesting enough in studying about Stetson, the hat style originated in England and Stetson lost the court case to get ownership rights.

Hat industy is interesting. Stetson sold out to Resistol, Resistol sold back to Stetson and Stetson sold out to American Hat....seems they all have problems in keeping "Hats on the world and making a living at it."

In the store in St Joseph they have a beautiful beaver that I would love to have but just could not get myself to part with the $3,000.00 (YES, that is correct) they wanted for it. Last time I was through there it was still in the case.

Good Luck,

 

[Iggy]

I had an uncle that was a good friend of John B Stetson back in the 30's and 40's. My uncle's name was Buck. He was 6'7" and weighed 300 pounds. Back in the 40's JB came out with the " The Big Buck" named for him. It was a 10 X beaver Stetson and JB gave my uncle one for each of the 5 male members of the family at the time.

I was always told that each X represented the number of pelt's worth of beaver hair it took to make a particular hat.

Back then each X was worth $10.00 and that was the best hat that JB made at the time. Now I will admit that a $100 Stetson was pretty prime doin's in the 40's. My Dad wore that hat for years and I wound up with it in the 60's. It only gave up the ghost when I was tightening a wire on a barb wire fence and the wire broke. The end came right by my face, ripped the hat off my head and shredded the brim.

I still wear the Resistol my folks gave me for my 21st Birthday from time to time. I think it was a 5X beaver.
You can see it in the picture up in the corner of this post and in the picture below.

I've got a Bailey's hat for marryin's and buryin's, but it sure din't cost no $500 or more. Don't think it cost $100 and I been wearin' it for more than 10 years.

I guess what I'm sayin' is you can fair pass for a cowboy without sellin' the farm to git a hat.

 

[potthawg]

Good Advice

I guess what I'm sayin' is you can fair pass for a cowboy without sellin' the farm to git a hat.

Sage advice from an old cowboy.

 

[zoom6zoom]

Yeah, I'm partial to them. It bugs me not to be able to wear one while driving anymore. Damn headrests. And it's getting hard to find anyone to clean and shape them. Even the western wear stores don't do it anymore.

The 5X Stetson up top was a gift from my best friend shortly before he passed away from lung cancer. Somewhat ironic as he got it by cashing in cigarette coupons. But it's something to remember him by. The other 5X was from Sheplers, and cost a poor college student the princely sum of $45 in 1978. The beat up Stetson straw (stripped of the gaudy feathered band it came with) served me well working on a Kansas cattle ranch during summer college breaks. The other is a Resistol George Strait.

 

[Cyrano]

Here in El Paso there isn't enough winter for my one felt hat. I've a couple of straw ones, and they get a lot of use (and show it).

 

[akviper]

I'm thinkin' these might be real cowboy hats. My grandpa and grand uncle sometime before the 1920s in South Dakota.

 

[slowburninsteve]

I'm thinkin' these might be real cowboy hats. My grandpa and grand uncle sometime before the 1920s in South Dakota.

Check out the auto pistol in the waistband of the guy on the left. Also, it must have been a very cold and rough climate where they were to require wearing all that sheepskin and leather!
Steve

 

[feralmerril]

Looks to be a colt pocket auto, 32 or 380.

 

[george minze]

I had an uncle that was a good friend of John B Stetson back in the 30's and 40's. My uncle's name was Buck. He was 6'7" and weighed 300 pounds. Back in the 40's JB came out with the " The Big Buck" named for him. It was a 10 X beaver Stetson and JB gave my uncle one for each of the 5 male members of the family at the time.

I was always told that each X represented the number of pelt's worth of beaver hair it took to make a particular hat.

Back then each X was worth $10.00 and that was the best hat that JB made at the time. Now I will admit that a $100 Stetson was pretty prime doin's in the 40's. My Dad wore that hat for years and I wound up with it in the 60's. It only gave up the ghost when I was tightening a wire on a barb wire fence and the wire broke. The end came right by my face, ripped the hat off my head and shredded the brim.

I still wear the Resistol my folks gave me for my 21st Birthday from time to time. I think it was a 5X beaver.
You can see it in the picture up in the corner of this post and in the picture below.

I've got a Bailey's hat for marryin's and buryin's, but it sure din't cost no $500 or more. Don't think it cost $100 and I been wearin' it for more than 10 years.

I guess what I'm sayin' is you can fair pass for a cowboy without sellin' the farm to git a hat.

Good looking horse, well muscled, sure don't look like no mountain horse though. to good looking for a mtn. horse...