I think I have bought every hat out there that looked like an Indy fedora. I always bought my hats in 3's when a new offering was found. Some, like the Federation and Federation Deluxe, I have bought more than 3. If I liked the hat, I moved beyond the perfunctial 3. How about you guys? How much have you spent? Here is a list of what I have bought, in new hats over the last 10 years, if you are curious as to what I have owned. I have lost track of the order of purchase, but I know what the first ones were, and the chronological order. The rest, will just be close to being right because there was a time when we found out about a new offering from several different vendors at one time. I would buy 3 from all of them. Bee Brands Indy 500 (my very first Indy fedora found at a local outdoor shop back in 1992, and the most accurate Radiers fedora I have seen from a factory. Too bad the felt was cheap and fell apart on my head)
Mallory Indy fedora(made in Canada) (got this one from a mail order catalog, that showed the TOD bridge scene fedora. It wasn't even close!!!)
Stetson Temple(got these from a local western hatter who ordered them for me from Stetson)
Stetson Nostalgia(from same hatter as the Temple. This dates back to the days of Indyfan when we were all there)
Gary White Custom. (Michaelson ended up with this one on a horse trade)
Miller Indy fedora (this was a hot item for the fans when we first discovered it. What a nice tobacco color too! I bought many of these)
Keppler Indy fedora. (my first ones were too wide for my face, so I took Dakota's advice and ordered the long oval. Perfect!!!)
HJ. (I have lost track of the number I have owned, but have seen several different felts and shades of brown coming out of HJ, before the SAB days.
Optimo. (bought 3 of these babies as I was impressed with the felt at that time as well as the craftmanship. Still impressed with the craftmanship)
Akubra Bushman(great hat)
Akubra Campdraft(my all time favorite hat out of Akubra. Ron knew how much I loved this hat and awhile after Akubra discontinued my favorite hat, Ron called me and said he had found one in my size in his shop, that had not sold and got buried. I bought it immediately!! It remains to this day the finest Akubra I ever owned)
Akubra Drover. I bought one of these after _ had bought one from David Morgan and had a local hatter show him how to do the dimensional cut. This was _'s first Indy fedora, I think, and he got all of us looking toward Akubra as our Indy hatter. Ron was kind enough to start dealing with the anal Indy fans. Now that I think about it, _ actually taught me and others how to do a dimensional cut, via the hatter he met. Man, what a history we have here!!!) I think this hat should be ahead of the other Akubras in the chronological order. Too late now to edit, or just too lazy to do so. I will let it stand.
Akubra Federation. (this is what Ron got Akubra to make for us Indy fans, with input from me, Michaelson, IndyDawg, and Mk. A project by committee. I think we done well on this one as it remains a top choice for an Indy fedora. And it introduced Ron Lilburne to the madness we call gearhead syndrome. I don't think he has recuperated yet!!!
)Akubra Deluxe Federation. (now, I am foggy on the development of this Akubra, perhaps Michaelson will recall the details. I don't know if it was Ron's idea to offer a different shade of brown with the Heritage line of fur, or if it came from here. But, it was my favorite Akubra next to the Campdraft, that much I do know. And, I have owned scoreds of them. And, I need to order another one soon before the rush of orders Ron will get with the new Indy film.)
GH(hate to even mention this, but gotta be honest here in the list. And it adds quite a bit to the grand totals of my purchases.
The truth of the matter is, I never owned one of his hats. What I did was to buy a pure beaver body from him, sweat, liner, ribbon and then used the parts to make my own. And I did not save much money by doing so. At the time, he did not even have the block to do the Indy fedoras, and I did. This led to me doing the block work on the Indy fedoras he sold here during that period. Some of the fans requested that he use my block. A long story, I won't burden you with. So, I owned a hybrid GH is more accurate. Add to this some 1928 bodies that I bought from him, 6 of them at 350.00 a pop, and I am still wincing from that. But, I am not including those in my grand total because I only kept one of them for myself. I included that one. )AB. (Of course I had to include this one, but only own one of my own. I do have a moss green body that I bought myself last fall, but don't know if I will ever find the time to turn it into a hat. If I do, rest assured it will be totally Raiders, and I will distress it to get a SOC look. I currently alternate my AB with my vintage 10x Stetson and one of my vintage HJs. The rest of my vintage collections stay in moth balls and cedar, stored in tight boxes. I want to admire those hats instead of wearing them out. They cannot be replaced and to me anyone who wears a vintage hat exclusively should be hanged, and then shot. You take care of antiques, and irreplacable items. IMHO. My feelings today are, "it belongs in a museum"
Now, I always forget one or two brand of hats when I make these lists, so I am sure I did so this time as well. If I remember them later on, I will add to the list here. How about you guys, lets see some lists of the hats you have owned, or still own. Regards, Fedora
! I don't even want to go here...as, my hat experience started out with no cash outlay -- inherited as a child, etc. Then, it started in my early twentys (now in my 50's)....I would say that I probably have both of you (Steve/Marc) beat on cost facters...well over ten grand, or more, over the years!
I don't have the heart to stretch them. $175
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