My Bloomingdales catalog (1886, page 17) shows 4 illustrations of 
"children's suits" for boys aged 2 to 5 years.  One of the lads is holding a 
small rifle.  All have cropped hair.

-----Original Message----- 
From: Robert Leavitt
Sent: Friday, July 03, 2015 2:39 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: skirts on little boys

Susan:  I have biographies of a few western
mining men: one has a picture of the subject, age
5 in 1898, informally dressed in trousers,
another has the subject, age 4 in 1892, more formally dressed in a 
dress/kilt.

I suspect that the decision as to when to switch
boys into trousers was more a
place/financial/personal decision: place because
ready-made children's' clothing was not readily
available in all places; financial because
ready-mades cost more to buy than the material
for home-mades: personal on two counts 1)
children's dresses/kilts were easier to make than
trousers; 2) At what age would a boy suddenly
realize that boys/men didn't wear dresses? And
start complaining? For diaper-age children, the
ease of changing would be a definite
consideration - snaps weren't in use and
pins/buttons took more effort to use. Looking at
my family pictures, my parents seem to have
begged the question - at least outdoors in good
weather. I have pictures of my brother and me
running around in neither. Of course, for
neonates there was the practicality - with no way
to determine the sex of a child before birth, run
off several dresses/kilts to start with, then
worry about possibly changing later.

For dating, try to find a time series of
Sears/Wards catalogues. My 1892 Wards shows a
variety of "children's" skirts/dresses with the
only size information being the length, the rest
of the children's department is missing.

Robert


>On Fri, Jul 3, 2015 at 2:16 PM, Susan Walter <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> > July 3, 2015
> > Hi All,
> >
> > I have a project luckily augmented with the family’s photos.  My male
> > subject was born in 1881, and the first photos of him depict him wearing
> > little kilts / dresses.
> >
> > Has anyone got good references about the gender neutral dresses for 
> > young
> > children that was common up even until the 1930s?  I’m not finding 
> > much
> > written at all, except that that both boys & girls wore the same type of
> > garments up to about the age of 5.
> >
> > I’m positing these open bottomed garments were helpful for diaper
> > changing...
> >
> > I used to have a book ­ it was called something like When Boys Woore
> > Dresses ­ and it showed a young boy (the author’s son) onn the cover 
> > in a
> > short dress.  I cannot find the darned thing, either here in my office 
> > nor
> > trolling around amazon.  Anyone recognize that?  Or know of other
> > references?
> >
> > I appreciate any help!
> > S. Walter
> >
>
>
>
>--
>kevin m. donaghy
>graduate student
>Temple University
>Department of Anthropology