Living history clothes for 1775

[Andy A]

Guys,.
I teach a class of Am Hist 5th grade. We are studying the Colonial/Rev War time period. I'd like to show them what the clothing looks like.
Does anyone make period clothing for that time era??
Any help would be appreciated.

Andy A

[wmrike]

There are quite a few sites that provide period clothing.  Do a Google search for "colonial clothing" or some such and you'll get a nice list.  Might start at gggodwin.com.

http://etext.lib.virginia.edu/subjects/runaways/ is a excellent site that gives extensive contemporary descriptions of the clothing worn in the Tidewater area of Virginia in colonial times.  It's a lot of fun to pour through and kids should love the descriptions and language.

[Mike R]

Yeah,  google 18th cent clothing--lots of sites.  Townsend sells a variety of clothes if you want reasonably priced examples to display, but others make better ones. NOTE:  many or most of these clothiers will use machine stitches, which technically are not right for 18th cent clothes [the sewing machine not coming along until the 19th cent]. But the cut/style and materials can be had that mimic period clothes. One of my favorites is Cobb Creek Merchants out of MO. 

[Dennis Glazener]

Guys,.
I teach a class of Am Hist 5th grade. We are studying the Colonial/Rev War time period. I'd like to show them what the clothing looks like.
Does anyone make period clothing for that time era??
Any help would be appreciated.

Andy A

Andy,
If you mention the general area of the school someone might know of an re-enactment group or individual that would be willing to come to your class with his/her Rev War outfit on. Many of those guys love to visit schools. I know some in the central and eastern part of VA that might be interested.
Dennis
 

[brokenflint]

Andy   try these for a start, google is your friend, use it.

http://www.americanrevolution.org/clothing/colonial7.html
http://historicaltrekking.com/forums/
http://www.reenactor.net/forums/index.php?PHPSESSID=4da2e8c5b2bf77e6d4b66a0a6001f467&action=forum

Broke

[Mike R]

I would also recommend  Graphic Enterprises Pioneer Times [google] for many photos of period attired reenactors as well as links.

[J.D.]

Though dressed primarily as woodsmen, there are also a lot of good photos of reenactors in pretty correct period clothing on the "Dutch Rats" Colonial trade Faire  page.

http://chasseurs.homestead.com/TradeFaire.html

Scroll down to the "Photos of past fairs, on the lower left of the page.

An even better several pages of photos, including  a series of photos of Red Savages playing  Bagetawa (sp).

http://lfddb.homestead.com/tf02intro.html

While there are many photos of people  near me, I suppose I'm too nondescript to be included in any of those photos.  

IMHO, the worst anachronism of the reenactors appearing in these photos is that NO ONE in the 18th century would have been so well fed, and so out of shape as a majority of these folks.  

God bless

[Artificer]

I agree that woodsman would not have been so out of shape and carrying extra pounds.  Until middle age, farmers would not have been carrying extra pounds.

However, townspeople and the rich had their share of folks carrying extra pounds.  Cooks especially were often not trusted to cook well if they were skinny.  Some tradesmen would have been skinny, but some tradesmen would have packed extra pounds on when their trade did not require as much physical exertion.  Tailors, cordwainers and the like would have been more likely to have extra pounds.

What we often do not think about is the quantity of booze they drank in those days.  That can easily pack on pounds they didn't get from food.  

I'm too old and am carrying too many pounds to truly be representative of even a "professional private" in the Major's Coy, 42nd Royal Highland Regiment - though I'm still in better shape than some folks 20 or even 30 years my junior.  Most enlisted soldiers of the British Army would have been skinny, though some of the Officers were pudgy to downright fat.  

Packing extra pounds was often looked upon as being prosperous then.

Many of these gentlemen are packing some extra pounds.

http://images.quickblogcast.com/4/6/0/6/4/155407-146064/declaration_of_independence_signers.jpg