Women models a Sunday-best style pioneer hat in Salt Lake City, UT
Pioneer men and women are an important aspect of the American experience. Whether you need a Halloween costume or are dressing for a play that takes place in the American West, you'll want to pay homage to these people appropriately by creating as authentic a wardrobe as possible.
Use Original Source Material
Go online and look at pictures of pioneers to get started. You can also look through books on the American West at the library or shuffle through your own family photos taken during that time period. Make notes or photocopies so that you will be representing pioneer clothing accurately. Try "Pioneer Women: The Lives of Women on the Frontier" by Linda Peavy and Ursula Smith or
"Words West: Voices of Young Pioneers" by Ginger Wadsworth for some original pictures. You can begin looking online at the University of Alberta's website (See Resources) or Triangle C Ranch's website (See Resources). Although you will have to look for pictures of the year you are looking to costume, if you need a specific date, the general "pioneer look" occurred from around the 1840s up until the turn of the 20th century.
Sunday Best or Regular Dress?
Many pioneers were pictured on formal occasions wearing their Sunday best. If you wish to portray your character or wear a costume of the Sunday best, you can absolutely use these pictures as source material. However, you will have to dig a bit more to find candid pictures of pioneers wearing their everyday attire.
Shoes
Most pioneers wore flat boots for both men and women, although women sometimes wore boots with a bit of heel to church and other activities. Instead of worrying over finding period boots, you can wear a jazz boot that will complete the look just fine (and works well for musicals). You can also find lace-up black or brown boots at most thrift or Western supply stores.
Men's Clothing
Pioneer men's clothing was often loose to facilitate hard manual labor. Men often wore clothes in light colors for spring and summer and darker colors for the fall and winter. Most Western supply stores will have acceptable shirts; try thrift stores will as well if you comb the racks. Shirts in that time period were mostly made of cotton or flannel and plaid shirts work just fine.
Men's pants varied quite a bit during this time. Levi Strauss invented the jeans during this period, so jeans and overalls are acceptable depending on what type of pioneer you wish to portray. These pants were worn by gold diggers and farmers. Men also often wore wool, linen or cotton pants a size or two bigger to make manual labor easier. Suspenders were buttoned to the pants in the front and the back, although you may use suspenders with clips if you are not going for full authenticity. Many of these items can be purchased at thrift stores or found in your own closet.
Men's hats also varied widely. Farmers often worn straw hats while other intellectual types might wear a bowler or a rancher might choose a "cowboy hat." Think about what type of pioneer you are portraying when choosing the hat. These hats can be acquired at thrift stores and sometimes straw hats can be acquired at craft stores. Use a pair of scissors to cut parts of the straw hat to distress it, if you are going for a poorer look. You can also rub it in the mud.
Women's Clothing
Women often wore blouses and skirts to the floor or dresses that came to the floor. Their sleeves were often puffed and came down to their wrists with high necklines. Colors varied, but like the men, women often wore lighter clothing in the summer and warmer colors in the fall and winter. You can browse your thrift store for skirt and top combinations or look through the patterns at a sewing store to find a pioneer one you like. Pioneer dresses were sometimes ornate, complete with ruffles, so you can make it as fancy or plain as you wish. Use a cotton or linen or wool for your dress, if making it from scratch.
During this time, women also often wore calico aprons. Most were about eight inches shorter than the skirt. Some were waist length, but other had a bib on top for protecting the top part of the dress. Most sewing patterns will come complete with an apron pattern, but you can also use plain white aprons from your local cooking supply store or thrift store.
Women in that day wore several undergarments. In addition to corsets, women also wore an underdress (like a cotton shift) and pantaloons. The pataloons often had a hole in the crotch to facilitate going to the bathroom. You can elect to wear these or not, depending on how authentic you want to be. You can usually find these types of undergarments at costume stores or you can sew your own pantaloons from a pattern at the sewing supply store. All of the undergarments were made of linen, cotton or wool.
Bonnets were also an important part of female pioneer life, although sometimes women wore other hats, such as straw hats. These were important to keep the sun out of their face. You can purchase bonnets at a Western supply store or costume shop. Sometimes, you can find bonnets at places like pioneer museums.
Tags: often wore, straw hats, supply store, thrift stores, Western supply
