Club Obi Wan

What's happened to Jack@HJ? "The requested user does not exist?"

He asked to be removed so he can concentrate on making the hats for Herbert Johnson. He's still very much apart of them he just needed to step back and concentrate on production. You can still send all messages through their Facebook, and Instagram pages. As well as contacting HJ directly for a hat

Tennessee Smith wrote:He asked to be removed so he can concentrate on making the hats for Herbert Johnson. He's still very much apart of them he just needed to step back and concentrate on production. You can still send all messages through their Facebook, and Instagram pages. As well as contacting HJ directly for a hat

Thanks. He has contributed a great deal to the hobby in the short time he was here. I would support the idea of reinstating the fascinating and historic HERBERT JOHNSON REBOOT topic as a locked thread, if there is enough interest for that. His desire to focus on his work is indicative of a success that, judging from my experience with the new HJ, is well deserved.

eazybox wrote:

Tennessee Smith wrote:He asked to be removed so he can concentrate on making the hats for Herbert Johnson. He's still very much apart of them he just needed to step back and concentrate on production. You can still send all messages through their Facebook, and Instagram pages. As well as contacting HJ directly for a hat

Thanks. He has contributed a great deal to the hobby in the short time he was here. I would support the idea of reinstating the fascinating and historic HERBERT JOHNSON REBOOT topic as a locked thread, if there is enough interest for that. His desire to focus on his work is indicative of a success that, judging from my experience with the new HJ, is well deserved.

Seconded! It's really informative. Even if he's no longer going to be contributing to the forum, it would be a shame to lose the information.

Thirded!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

As much as we'd love to, at this time, until we get clarification and approval, the content needs to remain sealed, pending removal.
We all agree, there is a wealth of information in there, and I'd hate to see it lost, as well.

I want to try to at least scavenge the thread for the reviews and move them to a common place, like we do with the other vendors.
Something along the line of "HJ Reboot - Post your hats here" sort of thing. Maybe with a statement up front to set what it's about.

If permission is granted we'll try to pull as much historical content out as possible.
Again, pending approval.

Unfortunately it's out of our hands right now.

Dalexs

You sound a little pessimistic about the possibility that he will say yes. Is there some reason for that? Obviously we need to wait for approval, but Jack was always happy to share whatever information he could with us. [knock on wood] it seems like it's just a matter of waiting patiently.

If he doesn't give approval though, maybe we can start a thread where members who followed Jack@HJ's posts can share what information they recall as a resource for the future.

Mulceber wrote:You sound a little pessimistic about the possibility that he will say yes. Is there some reason for that? Obviously we need to wait for approval, but Jack was always happy to share whatever information he could with us. [knock on wood] it seems like it's just a matter of waiting patiently.

If he doesn't give approval though, maybe we can start a thread where members who followed Jack@HJ's posts can share what information they recall as a resource for the future.

The membership here has been generally very respectful, but some comments I've seen on other sites have been quite brutal. Most were from people who hadn't even seen and experienced one of his hats firsthand. Indy fans can be a tough crowd, and he may have decided he just didn't need the headaches. Or it could simply be that the level of interest became too great and began to interfere with his work. I hope that was the case, and that the "lynch mob" hasn't killed the goose that laid the golden Poets.

eazybox wrote:The membership here has been generally very respectful, but some comments I've seen on other sites have been quite brutal. Most were from people who hadn't even seen and experienced one of his hats firsthand. Indy fans can be a tough crowd, and he may have decided he just didn't need the headaches. Or it could simply be that the level of interest became too great and began to interfere with his work. I hope that was the case, and that the "lynch mob" hasn't killed the goose that laid the golden Poets.

I had no idea - what a shame. I had a critique or two, but as far as I'm concerned, the resurrection of HJ has been one of the most exciting things to happen to this hobby in a while.

Mulceber wrote:

eazybox wrote:The membership here has been generally very respectful, but some comments I've seen on other sites have been quite brutal. Most were from people who hadn't even seen and experienced one of his hats firsthand. Indy fans can be a tough crowd, and he may have decided he just didn't need the headaches. Or it could simply be that the level of interest became too great and began to interfere with his work. I hope that was the case, and that the "lynch mob" hasn't killed the goose that laid the golden Poets.

I had no idea - what a shame. I had a critique or two, but as far as I'm concerned, the resurrection of HJ has been one of the most exciting things to happen to this hobby in a while.

Same here. He encouraged constructive criticism, not defamation of character. But again, I didn't notice any of that here on this site.

Just before this spirals out of control based on any speculations IndyGear management still has a good relationship with Jack. It was nothing us or our members have done. He's honestly just concentrating on production.

Hopefully we'll get clarification about how to handle the history and informational parts that were contributed by him.

Like Dalexs said, we're just waiting approval on how to post this information

Tennessee Smith wrote:Just before this spirals out of control based on any speculations IndyGear management still has a good relationship with Jack. It was nothing us or our members have done. He's honestly just concentrating on production.

Hopefully we'll get clarification about how to handle the history and informational parts that were contributed by him.

Like Dalexs said, we're just waiting approval on how to post this information

Good to know - thanks for the clarification, Tennessee.

I'll be visiting the shop in Piccadilly this week. I'll ask about it.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Mulceber wrote:Good to know - thanks for the clarification, Tennessee.

Tennessee Smith wrote:Like Dalexs said, we're just waiting approval on how to post this information

wait... isn't that what I said 2 days ago???

Yeah, but we've all slept since then....

Regard! Michaelson

Dalexs wrote:

Mulceber wrote:Good to know - thanks for the clarification, Tennessee.

Tennessee Smith wrote:Like Dalexs said, we're just waiting approval on how to post this information

wait... isn't that what I said 2 days ago???

Yeah, but you said it pessimistically, he said it optimistically. That's barely even the same thing.

eazybox wrote:

Tennessee Smith wrote:He asked to be removed so he can concentrate on making the hats for Herbert Johnson. He's still very much apart of them he just needed to step back and concentrate on production. You can still send all messages through their Facebook, and Instagram pages. As well as contacting HJ directly for a hat

Thanks. He has contributed a great deal to the hobby in the short time he was here. I would support the idea of reinstating the fascinating and historic HERBERT JOHNSON REBOOT topic as a locked thread, if there is enough interest for that. His desire to focus on his work is indicative of a success that, judging from my experience with the new HJ, is well deserved.

Jack is a liar and a terrible hat maker I ordered 3 hats from him and the 3 of them had flaws, at least the management from HErbert Johnson are people with integrity and they kindly offered me a refund but as far as JAck goes I can't say anything good about him. He calls himself a master hatter and he is not even close to be that, not even MArc Kitter or Steve Delk called themselves that.

He is pretty good selling his lies and we are really dumb to believe them, I'm almost certain that he doesn't have the original block.

alex1152 wrote:

eazybox wrote:

Tennessee Smith wrote:He asked to be removed so he can concentrate on making the hats for Herbert Johnson. He's still very much apart of them he just needed to step back and concentrate on production. You can still send all messages through their Facebook, and Instagram pages. As well as contacting HJ directly for a hat

Thanks. He has contributed a great deal to the hobby in the short time he was here. I would support the idea of reinstating the fascinating and historic HERBERT JOHNSON REBOOT topic as a locked thread, if there is enough interest for that. His desire to focus on his work is indicative of a success that, judging from my experience with the new HJ, is well deserved.

Jack is a liar and a terrible hat maker I ordered 3 hats from him and the 3 of them had flaws, at least the management from HErbert Johnson are people with integrity and they kindly offered me a refund but as far as JAck goes I can't say anything good about him. He calls himself a master hatter and he is not even close to be that, not even MArc Kitter or Steve Delk called themselves that.

He is pretty good selling his lies and we are really dumb to believe them, I'm almost certain that he doesn't have the original block.

I don't know how long your post will remain up, but I have to say my experience contradicts it completely. The hat I received from Jack was perfect, the best hat I ever purchased from anyone, and only needed a little tweaking to improve the shape. As for not having the original block as you claim, Jack would have to be a genius to replicate the hat so well after so many other talented hatters have tried to do so for decades, and fallen short.

Did you get his beautiful "floating sweatband"? I'm almost certain that he tried to Immitate the work of a certain hatter that made the hats for Indy 4. Steve, Marc, Garrison and John make a far better Raiders. The only thing this guy has is a great talent to sell. Do you have any proof that he has the original block? 30 years lost and out of nowhere the block appears... kind of convenient isn't it? Just because he shares "information" with us doesn't mean it's true.

And calling himself master hatter what a joke! the guy can't even stitch a sweatband properly and claims that all the other hatters in the world do it wrong.

You're right, I'm sure that one of the admins is going to delete my comment because apparently in this forum the only hatter that you can attack is Penman.

alex1152 wrote:Did you get his beautiful "floating sweatband"? I'm almost certain that he tried to Immitate the work of a certain hatter that made the hats for Indy 4. Steve, Marc, Garrison and John make a far better Raiders. The only thing this guy has is a great talent to sell. Do you have any proof that he has the original block? 30 years lost and out of nowhere the block appears... kind of convenient isn't it? Just because he shares "information" with us doesn't mean it's true.

And calling himself master hatter what a joke! the guy can't even stitch a sweatband properly and claims that all the other hatters in the world do it wrong.

You're right, I'm sure that one of the admins is going to delete my comment because apparently in this forum the only hatter that you can attack is Penman.

This smells of politics to me and may be the reason Jack wanted out. Does being "almost" certain of something give you a license to engage in character assassination?

I don't know what a floating sweatband is. All I know is that I've studied videos and photos of the Raiders hat from every angle, and I've waited 30 + years to find one that matches it as well as the HJ reboot does. Steve's work, while nice, looks woefully inadequate now as far as accuracy goes.

If you would attack Jack this way in public, it isn't hard to imagine what you would say in PMs. Perhaps it was your wild accusations that helped kill "the goose that laid the golden Poets"?

Yeah man I'm one of the few who is not afraid to speak up, probably you don't know what his "floating sweatband" is because you're not used to own high quality hats, I'll tell you what it is, the sweatband sticks out of the hat body, which is terribly wrong.

alex1152 wrote:Yeah man I'm one of the few who is not afraid to speak up, probably you don't know what his "floating sweatband" is because you're not used to own high quality hats, I'll tell you what it is, the sweatband sticks out of the hat body, which is terribly wrong.

"Terribly"? That sounds like something that could be fixed with a little stitching.

Wow. Who gave Alex the rage pills?

Who are you to call him a liar? His explanation of how the block was recovered makes sense, and the information he's provided corroborates a LOT of what we've managed to piece together over the years. If he was actually trying to con people, he would not only have to have a spectacular imagination, he would have had to spend months or years pouring over the Indygear archives.

probably you don't know what his "floating sweatband" is because you're not used to own high quality hats

Not sure if you noticed, but eazybox basically just told you that he's owned (or at least inspected) Steve's work. For my part, I own two ABs and two Garrisons, and my rebooted HJ is up there with them in terms of quality.

He calls himself a master hatter and he is not even close to be that, not even MArc Kitter or Steve Delk called themselves that.

Who cares how he bills himself? It's not like there's some kind of rule about how you're supposed to describe yourself as a hatter.

the sweatband sticks out of the hat body, which is terribly wrong.

Mine does a LITTLE when I pop out the sweat, but that's REALLY a minor point. I can't see how that justifies the kind of anger I'm seeing from you.

Mulceber wrote:
Not sure if you noticed, but eazybox basically just told you that he's owned (or at least inspected) Steve's work. For my part, I own two ABs and two Garrisons, and my rebooted HJ is up there with them in terms of quality.
.

I have two hats made by Steve, a CS and a Magnoli HJ. Nothing against either, both are great (the Magnoli, of course, was made of lesser quality materials, although the felt apparently was new and, according to Steve, highly resistant to shrinkage). But in my opinion, Jack's hat surpasses both in quality and in terms of accuracy it blows them both away. It was the "Eureka!" hat that put an end to my quest.

OK, let's bring the emotions down a notch.

No need for name calling and/or unfounded accusations.



Regards,

Indiana Jeff

How odd that it should end this way for us after so many stimulating encounters.

Hey, Gang -

Just wanted to add that the Raiders hat looks totally "eureka" imho. And I have seen one Raiders hat in person way back, etc. I seems like the block through and through. BUT - I have one rabbit and one beaver and the sweatband on the beaver definitely sticks out in two areas. I will eventually have it fixed but it is a little weird.

The rabbit one is fine.

darthjones2 wrote:Hey, Gang - Just wanted to add that the Raiders hat looks totally "eureka" imho.

Thanks!

BUT - I have one rabbit and one beaver and the sweatband on the beaver definitely sticks out in two areas. I will eventually have it fixed but it is a little weird.

The rabbit one is fine.

Ok, now I'm a little confused about what we're talking about. When we say sticking out, are we talking about the stitching on the sweatband being loose, or about the leather of the sweatband not lying flush against the side of the hat? I assumed we meant the former, but if Alex was complaining about his HJ's sweatband not being perfect, I've got news for him: both of my Garrison hats do that, and one of my two Adventurebilts does too. In fact, the only hatters I've worked with who consistently get the sweat band to lie flat are Optimo and Art Fawcett. Almost everybody gets that wrong.

Penman does not get it wrong either. Since you brought it up.

Good to know. I haven't ordered from Penman, otherwise I'm sure I would have mentioned him alongside Art and Optimo.

My point is, a lot of really good hatters get that wrong from time to time. Declaring the HJ reboots poorly made over that detail is ignoring the fact that they're in very esteemed company in that regard.

I agree.

And for the record, getting the sweatband sewn in right, where it flanges out to match the bevel of the hat, and level with the edge,
in my opinion, is one of the hardest things to do.
It takes a ton of patience, a quality sweatband, tight stitching, AND a good set of eyes!

I've look at 3 different hats I've made over the last few years, and the one I did about 6 years ago's ago, with a sweat band the Steve Delk gave me, is by far the best sewing job.
The others, made in the last 3 years, both have some level of unevenness, and float a bit in spots.

Requiring reading glasses in these last few years, has made constructing hats a very difficult task.
But at then end of the day, only I am ever going to notice the flaws, so if they're not perfect, I don't get that bent over it.

Dalexs

I've never made a hat, but that's been my impression as well: it looks like getting the leather to perfectly match the contours of the felt would be a REALLY difficult task. That's why I don't knock hats that get it wrong. I just assign brownie points to those that get it right. Besides, there are so many other details an Indy hatter has to get right (perfect block shape, perfect bash, perfect ribbon) that nobody would ever expect from people like Art or Graham. It hardly seems fair to get upset about details that don't affect the look (or longevity) of the hat.

Also: really easy to just say a whole bunch of stuff on the internet. At least back up what you are saying with pictures. What are the "flaws" you're talking about, alex?

Resistol marketed a "floating" hat band in the 60's...don't know why a properly done one would be a bad thing.

I've seen the quality of the hats first hand and they are not good. I have pics of the sweatband issue but don't know how to post them, if someone has a suggestion to help I'll be happy to load the pics I have. Also, there is a video on YouTube somewhere, I'll try and supply a link when I can get it, of an HJ slipping over a Steve Delk Raiders block and it's a perfect match.... that's not good (ie. claims Jack@HJ has " THE" original Raiders block). To those that support and have the new HJs I don't dispute the quality of your hats and I appreciate your enthusiasm for HJ coming back but the hats I've seen are not very good and not well made. I have had several knockoffs since the first movie, two Peters Bros. hats, a Penman beaver Raiders, and a Steve Delk beaver Raiders and none these had the specific sweatband issue. Hope this helps

jlee562 wrote:Also: really easy to just say a whole bunch of stuff on the internet. At least back up what you are saying with pictures. What are the "flaws" you're talking about, alex?

Resistol marketed a "floating" hat band in the 60's...don't know why a properly done one would be a bad thing
.

Maybe because the original did not have a floating sweatband?

Who knows? It may have for all WE know.

Swales was awfully tight lipped about anything to do with the actual construction of the hat.

Regard! M

I have pics of the sweatband issue but don't know how to post them, if someone has a suggestion to help I'll be happy to load the pics I have.

See my previous post - a LOT of hats, even Adventurebilts, have that particular defect, because it's extremely difficult to perfectly contour the leather the shape of the hat.

Maybe pictures would make my point more clearly:

Garrison:


Adventurebilt:


Herbert Johnson:


They all have the floating sweatband, and they're all extremely well-made hats.

micsteam wrote:Also, there is a video on YouTube somewhere, I'll try and supply a link when I can get it, of an HJ slipping over a Steve Delk Raiders block and it's a perfect match.... that's not good (ie. claims Jack@HJ has " THE" original Raiders block).

That doesn't mean very much - there's no way you'd actually be able to tell from a video whether it's a "perfect fit," because when the hat is on the block there's no way to see inside the hat. If it was even remotely close, which Steve's block undoubtedly was, then a new HJ could slip over the block and appear to be a perfect fit. The message that video is trying to send (that HJ is using the same block as Steve Delk) also just doesn't make any sense - the only people who have Steve's block are Steve and John Penman. So, either way, it's simply a case of Steve's block being similar to the block HJ is using.

I guess what I hear the majority saying between the lines is "trust Jack at all costs no matter what. Whatever he says is gospel truth". Sorry. I just don't think that way. Just my opinion on all this. Remember, Jack was a factory man first, then went to bespoke. So there are things he probably is still working on to perfect his hat making skills. I do find it odd though that almost every account has the crown being or looking too tall.

Odd, Jeremiah, I haven't seen anyone say that at all.

I've seen folks say 'look at the hats we're receiving' as proof of what we're being told.

So far, everything I've seen, read, and the hats I've personally examined has been what he's said.

Regards! M

I guess what I hear the majority saying between the lines is "trust Jack at all costs no matter what.

I think you're (unintentionally) misrepresenting the position of the other side. We see things that the hat is doing from different angles that look right, things that we see (almost) nowhere else. We hear things that Jack has told us about what was going on internally at HJ that match suspicions and deductions that members of the gear community have had for decades.

What I see the naysayers doing here is casting doubt based on virtually no evidence (e.g. the youtube video with the HJ and the AB block) and claiming that it's a terribly made hat based on one, relatively unimportant detail that many of their favorite hatmakers have gotten wrong as well.

I do find it odd though that almost every account has the crown being or looking too tall.

It's due to hat size. The hat Harrison Ford wore was a size 7 1/4 with a 5.5" crown. The HJ block is 5.5" when your hat size is 7 1/4. Unfortunately, nowadays, most of us have bigger heads, and the HJ block scales up the height of the crown about a quarter of an inch with every hat size. So my size 7 1/2 is 6 inches open crown. I suspect Jack is scaling the crown up too much. 1/8 of an inch for each hat size would probably be better.

Maybe you are right. But proof goes both ways. No?

I've searched for the "HJ hat on a Delk hat block" video and if it exists, I can't find it. Even so, unless Steve changed his block drastically since I bought his hats in 2007--2008, all it takes is a simple side-by-side comparison to prove that theory is complete nonsense.

I have hats from four different makers and all of them have sweatbands that "float" at some place or another. Whereas I noticed it, I never gave it a second thought nor does it affect the fit or feel of the hats.

I would like to see this video of an HJ hat on an AB block. There aren't that many of the HJ bespoke hats out there and as Mulceber wrote, so far as anyone knows there are only two people on the planet with access to AB blocks.

The other thing to consider putting a hat on a block to gauge the fit, when a felt is blocked it is wet/steamed. Putting a dry hat (with the sweatband and liner intact?) over a block won't give a true sense of how well one matches the other.


Regards,

Indiana Jeff

Just to find some old 'stuff' laying around here, our own Mattdeckard, now of Stetson, made the following comment:

I actually have some felt hats that are cooler than one of my straw hats because of airflow. Sometimes when the sweat band is floating away from the felt you get open airflow.

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=13100&hilit=floating+sweat+band" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Interesting comment regarding the term 'floating sweat band'.

Regard! M

micsteam wrote: Also, there is a video on YouTube somewhere, I'll try and supply a link when I can get it, of an HJ slipping over a Steve Delk Raiders block and it's a perfect match.... that's not good (ie. claims Jack@HJ has " THE" original Raiders block).

Uh oh haha, thats interesting. I couldn't find the video you're talking about with a pretty thorough search. Any chance you'd have a link for it? I actually couldn't find a whole lot of video on the new HJ hats in general. There seems to be a surprisingly sparse youtube presence from the Indy community. Curious

Michaelson wrote:Just to find some old 'stuff' laying around here, our own Mattdeckard, now of Stetson....

As an aside, Matt Deckard is no longer with Stetson; rather, he recently partnered with UK hatmaker Christys, and posted to Instagram and other social media sites: "Someone asked me if I'm working at Christys' now… yes, I do, I'm the US agent for this traditional British brand."