Ok, i know Herbert Johnson made the hats for the original three and Steve/Marc made the KOTCS hats. So what are people talking about when they say Steve is making a HJ or Magnolia? Is it just a style or did AB buy the copyright? Is it different than Steves regular Raiders fedora?
DR Ulloa wrote:To put things into perspective, the hat nutcracker Indy is waring in Michaelson's pic is an HJ that Steve did not work on, after a rain storm. ;-)
Steve, is taking the raw material and building a Hj for Magnoli. It's is a better hat than the regular HJ you would get from anywhere else with the HJ logo.
Steve's AB is top of the line. The Magnoli/Hj by Steve would be the way to go if you must have the HJ logo in you hat.
I would say that th Mag HJ/AB is the most authentic looking Raiders hat. It won't be nearly as tough as the AB, but it will look better than any othe hat for Raiders, in my humble opinion.
UpstateIndy wrote:So does Steve just reblock them and spruce them up? HJ is a whole different company than AB.
or...
Does steve make them hisself and if so why doesn't he call them AB's like they are?
Steve uses all the parts of the HJ, ages the felt better (which means it will resist shrinking longer), blocks it with his more accurate block, and does the work by hand (rather than in mass assembly). Also, I think he changes the ribbon to a more accurate color. So, you have an HJ constructed by Steve, which means it's as good a hat as the parts could possibly allow.
I have a Herbert Johnson and I like it. It looks like a English poet's hat. But it tapers in towards the top of the crown. I've received many compliments on it. But I suspect that Steven Spielberg and Harrison Ford were searching for a style that was no longer being made and settled upon the H.J. because it came closest to their concept, and then - being who they were - had the hat customized to be the hat we know from the Raider's film.
Since then Spielberg and Ford have been able to find other sources, modifying the original, in search of perfection. The AB hat might be the ultimate, especially as it's beaver, and it's proportions appear to be just about right.
I'm curious about how AB approached, or were discovered, by Spielberg. They produced a hat and surpassed the competition. They're located in Missouri and that's some ways away from L.A. But, like everyone else in the audience, when I first saw the silhouette of the hat, I immediately recognized it. And in C.S. the hat was used not just as part of the costume, but as symbol, or trademark, and even as a character.
Read up on the story of AB on the Indy Gear main site. Pretty much, Peter Botwright passed Marc's name along to Bernie when the film was in pre-production and thats how AB got into the running for the film hat. The story is great and Indy Gear has a great write up on it.
