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I think one thing that occurred was that good clothing got worn and worn, and handed down until it was only fit for the ragman.
Look at a copy of Jacob A. Riis's book How the Other Half Lives, published in 1901. It is photos of how the common grunt lived in New York City in that era. One thing that is remarkable, along with the shocking squalor, is that some of the men are wearing suits even though they are indigent, and many other men are wearing at least suit jackets and hats though their pants are filthy and baggy work pants. "Good clothes" seem to have been worn to the bitter end.
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Originally Posted by mco65
I think several factors come into play here. The first and most obvious is simply style. That was ths style back then... I am always amazed when I see old photographs from baseball games and all the men in the stands are wearing top hats with coats and ties.. compare that to today's ball park pictures. Not that today's game goers are any less stylish, they are just wearing what is in style today for a ball game.
Another thing to consider is clothing availabilty. Today you can run to the store and buy a new outfit everyday if you want to.. 100 years ago that was not the case. Clothing was not readily available so you took care of the clothes you had simple because you didn't know when you might be able to get a new pair of shoes or pants. There was also far less variety in clothes, especially mens clothes.. In many cases, you had to make your own clothes.. that or your mother or wife made your clothes for you. If you making your own clothes, you likely to take better care of them as they need to last you a while.
I think we take clothes for granted today where as folks 100 or so years ago did not. They knew that their shoes had to last them a decade or more where as today, most folks have more pairs of shoes in their closet to choose from today than their great grandparents had their entire lives.
That doesn't make any one generation better than the other, its just a product of our times. Clothing has become big business and folks are buying into it. Just think, if all we had to choose from was a black jacket, white shirt and dress pants then we are likely to only have a few outfits but since we have litterally thousands of styles to choose from we have a few dozen in our closet.
Another thing to consider is location. If your looking at photos from city dwellers then you are going to see the style of the city. Men wore coats and ties back then regardless of occupation, even street sweepers or lamp lighters had to wear a coat and tie... but if you were to take a look at some rural photographs of farmers they were not dressed quite as nicely... they wore floppy hats to protect them from the sun, grungy boots, pants and a shirt... sometimes a coat.. no ties or top hats for sod busters.
Two excellent posts!
I will add that you can tell that people in the past had many fewer clothes simply by the closet space, or lack of same, in older homes. Many people had 1 "Sunday" outfit plus a couple of sets of clothes for "everyday" or for work. Underwear was changed weekly ... and sometimes less frequently.
Only the very wealthy had the variety of clothing that most of us today have.
I will add that you can tell that people in the past had many fewer clothes simply by the closet space, or lack of same, in older homes. Many people had 1 "Sunday" outfit plus a couple of sets of clothes for "everyday" or for work. Underwear was changed weekly ... and sometimes less frequently.
Only the very wealthy had the variety of clothing that most of us today have.
I can promise you that my 9 year old son has more under wear in his underwear drawer today than my great grandfather had his entire life.. My great grandfather probably didn't have a special drawer JUST FOR UNDER WEAR!!!
Also, My great grandfather never lost a sock in the dryer! NEVER..
Even as late as 1980, if my wife had to go to WalMart, she would put on a casual skirt or dress, proper shoes, and give cursory attention to her hair before leaving the house.
Up to the '60s, neither of my parents would even dream of leaving the house without a hat -- and I don't mean a baseball cap.
I worked for a telephone company,Ct and now a ghetto area.
The foreman would mention dress and haircut when needed,for the most part dress,work clothes were clean and orderly among workers.It was the way life was then.
People back around the turn of the century dressed very nicely when out in public, but they didn't own a lot of clothing like we do today. They had their dress apparel for public, a couple morning dresses (if you were a woman) for doing housework, and and an afternoon dress if they were expecting guests. Also, they had Sunday apparel. For men, it was similar (the suit with the hat that they wore out in public), Sunday wear, and house wear.
People back then re-made clothing if it wore old. They turned it into something else useful. They also saved old clothing rather than giving them away like we do now. My grandmother explained all this to me years ago. They even turned flour sacks into dresses for children.
When I was in grade school we had to wear button up shirts and the girls had to wear dresses or skirts. I still remember the Kindergarten teacher checking our clothes and making sure we were clean before class started.
Up to the '60s, neither of my parents would even dream of leaving the house without a hat -- and I don't mean a baseball cap.[/quote]
I've been a baseball and football fan for decades and have seen more than my fair share of video of games from the 50's and 60's.
With pro football, one video I always remember is showing the crowd in the first Super Bowl (Green Bay Packers against the Kansas City Chiefs.) Every time the video would show the crowd, there was a few people dressed in white shirts, ties, and sport jackets. In fact, Chiefs head coach Hank Stram would always dress up when he was on the sidelines for a football game. So did a lot of other head coaches, probably Dallas Cowboy coach Tom Landry would be the one best noted for that. And he always dressed up that way until he was fired in 1989.
In the NFL's earlier years, wherever you lived, pretty much all games would start at noon or shortly thereafter. That changed in the early 1950's when the Los Angeles Rams and San Francisco 49ers came into the league.
With no team logo t-shirts, jackets, or ball caps most people would dress casually (except in cold weather) You WOULD see quite a few people with shirts, ties, sports, topcoats, etc. FWIW I think more people were churchgoers and after church service they would go straight to the stadium for the game.
With baseball, one video I remember all these years later was the 1963 World Series with the L.A. Dodgers against the New York Yankees. In game 4 Yankee first baseman Joe Pepitone lost a ball thrown by third baseman Clete Boyer that let in a couple runs. Pepitone said he lost the ball because of all the white shirts in the crowd. He was right. My parents subscribed to Life Magazine and it showed all the white shirts worn by people in the stands.
I can promise you that my 9 year old son has more under wear in his underwear drawer today than my great grandfather had his entire life.. My great grandfather probably didn't have a special drawer JUST FOR UNDER WEAR!!!
Also, My great grandfather never lost a sock in the dryer! NEVER..
The Times have changed..
I don't think it's that 'times have changed' so much as culture in this country. I work in a company that has many European and Asian scientist/doctors. They own just maybe two suits and just several sweaters and I see them in those clothes all the time. Their briefcases have to be 30 years old but they are still functional so they won't buy another one. They call Americans the 'throw away' society or the glutton society when they hear us talking about all the clothes in our closets, etc.
Here's what I do know: when I see people wearing jeans and t-shirts to Sunday church services, a part of me dies inside.
I remember wearing a dress on my first plane ride, and for almost all plane rides in the 70s. I also remember when that changed. It was the 80s, I was 13 or 14, and I remember picking out shorts (bermuda type) with a polo shirt and sandals for my flight back home to TX from Ft. Myers, FL. My grandmother was a little horrified. I had tan legs, I was skinny, and good lookin' after a summer in South Florida! I wanted to show that off!!
It's interesting that you posted on this topic. I was just discussing this with someone after watching episodes of "The Twilight Zone" on Netflix recently. It definitely seems like people dressed better and carried themselves with more self-respect back in the day. As a child, I recall all the hoopla when Mary Tyler Moore wore capris on "The Dick Van Dyke Show." Although Lucille Ball had worn pants on "I Love Lucy," I don't know that she ever appeared in public with them on.
I believe there are still a few people that dress according to their body type and profession without being slaves to the "latest style" but the general "tone" today is much more relaxed and sometimes even slovenly. A former neighbor wore make-up to her ex's funeral and considered herself "dressed up" although she was wearing jeans and a cotton shirt. Granted, she was only attending because the deceased was her oldest child's father but it was the first time I had seen such casualness at such an event. I've seen people wear sneakers and jeans to job interviews which is fine if the employers indicates that. Yet, that is not always the case.
Overall, I think it's getting worse and worse. I don't believe we have to wear tailored outfits everywhere. Nevertheless, there should be some level of decency when appearing in public.
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I had tan legs, I was skinny, and good lookin' after a summer in South Florida! 
