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They're usually made of yellow straw though. They were popular in the 1880s to 1920s and are part of a traditional barbershop quartet's costumes. It was just a very popular hat amongst all classes for about 5 decades. Maybe as it came cheaper to take photos in the 1900s, there were a lot of pictures of men in boater hats in photos at conventions and political rallies back then, and it just became synonomous with campaigning. I remember a lot of Bloom County cartoons had Opus the Penguin campaigning for vice-president in a boater hat.
In fact, I own an antique one that I won on Ebay. I'm a part time entertainer - magic, juggling, balloon twisting, and my costume is reminiscent of those days - a striped vest and bow tie and boater, to harken back to what a carnival barker might look like from the early 1900s. I have a friend who makes my vests, and for my seasonal ones, she also makes a band that can go around the normal band on my hat to match my vest. I had a star spangled one for my job twisting balloons in a restaurant over the 4th that looked pretty snazzy.
TlalocW
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