Glengarry's of old?

[Andrew M. Stewart]

Anyone know what with the new glens? The old ones looked alot better,a little less like a frycooks hat

[MacMillan of Rathdown]

Looking at old photos I suspect that the older hats were slightly taller, and had a pronounced curve to the bottom. Today's mass produced Glengarries seem to have less height, and quite often a flat bottom, which destroys any semblance of elegance in my opinion.

And you're right. They do tend to look like the hat worn by fry cooks.

[Nick the DSM]

Picture isn't working.

[Friday]

I vaguely remember reading, no reference comes to mind, that the first Glengarries were based on a hat, similar to the Balmoral, that someone blocked by pulling on the center front and back. This then lead to hats being knit to a Glengarry shape rather than a round hat pulled front and back. As a knit hat there would be more natural bend/curve for a knit hat, even a knit and felted hat would have the bend/curve.

The current manufacturing techniques for the Glenngarry doesn't have the give for the bend.

FYI "Folk Hats 32 Knitting Patterns & Tales from around the World" by Vicki Square, published by Interweave Press has a pattern for knitting a Glenngarry.

[KFCarter]

Frycook's hat. Exactly. I was trying to figure out why I didn't care for the Glenngarries I've looked at recently... you hit the nail on the head, sir.

[macwilkin]

I vaguely remember reading, no reference comes to mind, that the first Glengarries were based on a hat, similar to the Balmoral, that someone blocked by pulling on the center front and back. This then lead to hats being knit to a Glengarry shape rather than a round hat pulled front and back. As a knit hat there would be more natural bend/curve for a knit hat, even a knit and felted hat would have the bend/curve.

The current manufacturing techniques for the Glenngarry doesn't have the give for the bend.

FYI "Folk Hats 32 Knitting Patterns & Tales from around the World" by Vicki Square, published by Interweave Press has a pattern for knitting a Glenngarry.

That would be the old Hummel Bonnet:

http://www.albanach.org/hummel.htm

Regards,

Todd

[Jack Daw]

You want fries with that burger?

[Galloglass]

maist ordinari Heelan folk wore tamoshanters like a big pizza on thair heed ain glengarries worn bi Lairds ain sojers aw er thi warld ,jabobites wirnae needed in emericas
folk haid jacobite thochts in thair heed alang wi thair dreams

Thi bonni dresswear seen on here wir started by scottish militias thit started in emerica

[OC Richard]

The early Glens were taller. The earliest depiction I have is a painting done in the late 1840's of a piper of the 72nd Highlanders.

Now the story goes that an officer of the 79th Highlanders designed the Glengarry for their pipers in the 1840's.

Anyhow the Glen shrank to its modern size fairly quickly. The 79th New York was wearing the old tall Glens in 1859-1861 but back in Scotland the Glen seems to have shrunk by then.
Here are some 79th NY lads:



I don't think that these 79th NY glens were really much taller than modern ones at the highest point. The big difference is in how they're shaped, these old ones staying more level towards the front, modern ones strongly curving downwards towards the front.

Here's a veteran of the Thin Red Line wearing a Glen that to all intents and purposes is like modern ones:



Then they kept shrinking and by the 1880's through the first decade of the 20th century the fashion was to wear Glens a couple sizes too small perched up on the head at a rakish angle.



Nowadays in the military, and in top civilian pipe bands, the fashion is to wear a full-sized Glen shoved all the way onto the head.

[St. Amish]

It doesn't appear to me that the first two pics are any larger than modern glengarries, just worn higher on the head.