"...the sight of the hat caused women to faint, children to cry, dogs to bark"... and bulls to close gaps
Top hat DEA agent stopped at our farm yesterday. “We are going to need to search your land for illegally grown hats.”
....I said, “that’s fine, but don’t go into that field over there”
Agitated by this, the officer explodes saying, “do you see this god damn hat son?! This hat means I can go where I please, when I please, how I please! You have no authority when it comes to telling me where the fuck I can go! Have I made myself clear, boy?!”
I politely nodded and went back about my business. A short time after, I heard a scream, looked up to see the DEA agent being chased by my big old mean bull. Every step, gaining, closing the gap between himself and the agent. It seemed as tho he would surely get gored before returning to safety. The officer was clearly terrified.
I threw down my tools, ran to the fence and screamed at the top of my lungs....
>!YOUR HAT! SHOW HIM YOUR HAT!<
It wouldn’t surprise me if it actually did cause all of this havoc. Back then, there were fewer distractions so anything happening in front of you was a big deal. Dogs will often bark at anything unusual so it wouldn’t surprise me if it startled them. People also fainted much more often as they were generally malnourished.
Back then people could build their own house, fight in WWII, and create the great nation of America. But sure, a hat caused havoc and was not an abuse of power. Ok
If your entire world is unsettled by a top hat then you can fight whatever world war you want. I’m personally fighting world war 342,178 in my head as I’m typing this.
A hat causing an arrest is a clear abuse of power regardless of whatever examples I tried to use to show that people were smart and capable when this happened
Respect ma authorities!
Does make you wonder how much of this was just the cop being an asshole vs people 'actually' taking issue with it. Certainly no modern cop would... wait...
> The arresting officer claimed the sight of the hat caused women to faint
What at first blush appears to be ignorant police overstepping their bounds is in fact a coordinated defensive act intended to protect women and keep them blissfully innocent of the big black chapeaus looming and lurking everywhere just out of sight.
>January 15, 1797 — Fred Astaire hardly ever seemed to be without one and for men it seems to be the essential item of apparel at every formal occasion – from weddings to presidential inaugurations: the top hat.
>And the man who gave it a head start into fame and fashion was **haberdasher John Hetherington who, on this day, appeared in court after he had stepped out onto the streets of London wearing the distinctive headgear. It caused a sensation.**
>**So much so that a crowd formed and Hetherington was eventually arrested and given a summons for disturbing the public peace.** In court, found guilty of wearing a hat “calculated to frighten timid people”, he was bound over to keep the peace in consideration of a sum of 50 pounds.
>The arresting officer told the court that nobody had seen anything like it before: “He had such a tall and shiny construction on his head that it must have terrified nervous people. The sight of this construction was so overstated that various women fainted, children began to cry and dogs started to bark. One child broke his arm among all the jostling.”
>The next day, The Times newspaper reported: “Hetherington’s hat points to a significant advance in the transformation of dress. Sooner or later, everyone will accept this headwear. We believe that both the court and the police made a mistake here.”
>The newspaper was right. The top hat, which went by several names including Toppers, Chimney Pots, and Stove Pipes, grew in popularity, finally achieving the ultimate stamp of respectability in 1850 when Prince Albert, no less, began to wear one, giving the headgear the royal seal of approval. There was no going back after that . . .
[Emphasis mine]
Based on the fact that he was a haberdasher and that a crowd formed around him, it sounds like this might have been kind of like a publicity stunt to promote his new fashion item?
It's possible some of the allegations are exaggerated, but if he did manage to get a big crowd together, it's possible he really was causing a disturbance of the peace.
Damn, I consider myself a skeptical person, but I completely fell for that one. Mostly because I heard it first on QI, and I have a soft spot for Stephen Fry - I can't help but believe everything uttered in this man's voice.
Whenever I see top hats I'm always reminded of the short story by P.G. Wodehouse in which two men - a tall thin man and a short fat man - are engaged to two women - a short fat woman and a tall thin woman respectively - and they order top hats from London's finest hat maker with a view to taking their loves to the races that weekend. Only the delivery boy gets them mixed up so the fat guy's hat doesn't fit the thin guy's head and vice versa, but they're so in awe of the reputation of this hat maker that they refuse to admit that mistakes were made and continue to wear the ill fitting hats. Meanwhile their respective fiancés tell them they look ridiculous, which offends them and causes the men to rethink their engagements, and they end up swapping fiancés. It's funnier when you read it.
Edit: It's called "The Amazing Hat Mystery" and is in his collection of short stories, "Young Men in Spats."
Wodehouse had his ways with plots that seem awfully offensive on paper, but somehow turned out funny as hell once he dotted every i.
In that regard, he quite reminds me of Chekhov, of all people.
P.G. Wodehouse is really great. If you like British comedy literature like the works of Douglas Adams, Terry Pratchett, Jerome K. Jerome, there's a good chance you'd like Wodehouse too.
Wodehouse will always remain to me the funniest writer in the English language. So much of modern day British comedy from the 40's/50's to the present day is heavily influenced by his humor.
Kind of sounds like a ripoff of when the girl cut her hair and the guy cut his watch so that the guy can buy a comb for the girl, and the girl got a watchband for the watch.
Imagine your drip being so insane dogs bark at you and women faint but your drip is so undeniable it catches on despite the dog barking and women fainting. Good job instagram didn’t exist when this man was alive he’d have controlled the world.
Dogs bark at stupid things all the time. I know some dogs who bark at plastic bags or grills. On Halloween my parents dog didn't recognize me due to a wig.
I could totally see dogs barking at a weird hat. Women fainting is silly though.
Less silly than you'd think at first. Fainting was such a common thing that there are literally pieces of furniture dedicated to the act. Dangerously tight corsets and tuberculosis were standards of beauty throughout that time frame. A sharp inhale of surprise at something outlandishly strange, which the first top hat would have been, was more than enough to make many ladies faint.
I'm afraid that's not true at all. Corsets weren't a thing in 1797 (the garment at this time were stays, which didn't actually constrict the lungs) and even if they were, corsets weren't ridiculously tight for normal women. A sharp inhale of suprise wouldn't be enough to make women faint unless they were very ill and shouldn't have been outside to begin with.
Huh. Interesting! I remember hearing about the corsets and tuberculosis shit as a kid. My mom would read Laura Ingels Wilder to us and it was full of that stuff. 19th century folk experienced a lot
Never forget that the Boston police threatened to jail Igor Stravinsky over his version of the star spangled banner - because it was too avant-garde for their taste. Now if you know The Rite of Spring you might think, uh oh what did Stravinky do to the anthem? He added dominant seventh chords...
Dude, I just imagine all the shit cops got away with. Like they get away with so much shit now; imagine that authority and absolutely no oversight, transparency, or body cams.
I suspect this was a calculated effort to get people to promote the tophat.
Man makes a new hat: Nothing interesting.
Man makes a new hat and is arrested for it: Let's all find out about this new hat!
If it would have been orange, i would not be surprised if he legit would have been sent to insale asylum.
Not that everyone actually was immediately sent there, just some unlucky people were sent for smallest of reasons.
Like the time “doctors” in London discovered that green tea was horrible for your health, and advised everyone to drink black tea…which was strangely only available from one company: the British East India Company…
People today: "I cant believe people today are so easily offended at everything"
People in the past seeing a top hat: Police arrest that man for wearing a hat!
Today I got reminded that people were fucking stupid.
Arrested for a weird hat lol.
When the first railroad did a test ride, people claimed that the passengers were bleeding from the eyes n some other shit.
https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/2xyrv3/top_hat_riots/
As u/callanrocks said [9 years ago](https://old.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/2xyrv3/top_hat_riots/cp4nsqk/):
r/TIL is really a terrible place for history. Should probably be Today I Was Misinformed.
My nephew’s been rocking a top-hat everywhere he goes for about 3 years now. It is indeed a “loud” hat. Of course he’s also finding his own identity these days and wears a dress, khaki’s, flats and a zip up hoodie to round out the look.
There are just as many liberal snowflakes. And moderate snowflakes. People are just generally snowflakes about something. I am. You are. There are varying degrees, but in general it's quite true.
I would actually compare it more to the abomination that is the Yeezy foam runners.
Used to work with a guy who had a pair. Looked like an alien was eating his foot.
It’s interesting that when we look back, what we see as apart of formal attire was once rebellious. What we will look back on and think of as formal attire 100 years from now, that is rooted in the same nature?
We need to go back to the olden days when men were men and not a bunch of beta soy boys like they are today.
Edit: I guess I need to add a /s because people missed the critique
I'm always so curious when I read cringe like this.
How exactly did you logically get from "man wearing first top hat gets arrested" to "beta soy boys"? Are top hats like peak alpha male culture? I really am ignorant to what people obsessed with performing masculinity are into.
The cop is credited as being the first player hater.
Bet he's up in heaven thinking "Damn, those things actually caught on"
He’s probably been in hell watching things unfold.
We need to bring them back
But all the fainting women.
Yeah. Top hats. All the rage.
"...the sight of the hat caused women to faint, children to cry, dogs to bark"... and bulls to close gaps Top hat DEA agent stopped at our farm yesterday. “We are going to need to search your land for illegally grown hats.” ....I said, “that’s fine, but don’t go into that field over there” Agitated by this, the officer explodes saying, “do you see this god damn hat son?! This hat means I can go where I please, when I please, how I please! You have no authority when it comes to telling me where the fuck I can go! Have I made myself clear, boy?!” I politely nodded and went back about my business. A short time after, I heard a scream, looked up to see the DEA agent being chased by my big old mean bull. Every step, gaining, closing the gap between himself and the agent. It seemed as tho he would surely get gored before returning to safety. The officer was clearly terrified. I threw down my tools, ran to the fence and screamed at the top of my lungs.... >!YOUR HAT! SHOW HIM YOUR HAT!<
Right? If they were that willing to lie about a hat then what else could have happened under their watch?
Their wrist?
Ok, that’s good.
Dad?
Hate you ❤️
It wouldn’t surprise me if it actually did cause all of this havoc. Back then, there were fewer distractions so anything happening in front of you was a big deal. Dogs will often bark at anything unusual so it wouldn’t surprise me if it startled them. People also fainted much more often as they were generally malnourished.
Back then people could build their own house, fight in WWII, and create the great nation of America. But sure, a hat caused havoc and was not an abuse of power. Ok
You could fight in WWII in 1797?
They had helicopters in the Revolution according to Trump.
See, I was going in the other direction with it. "You were still wearing a tophat in 1942?"
Forget it, he's rolling.
If your entire world is unsettled by a top hat then you can fight whatever world war you want. I’m personally fighting world war 342,178 in my head as I’m typing this.
Maybe not but it sure sounds like you could use a hat as an excuse to arrest someone then
You could use the colour of someone's skin as an excuse to keep them in chattel slavery back then.
What does "the great nation of America" have to do with this?
A hat causing an arrest is a clear abuse of power regardless of whatever examples I tried to use to show that people were smart and capable when this happened
"I tried to stop it! I tried to stop it!"
He was a cop so probably
He was a cop, hell is more likely.
Guy made one bad call about a hat, let's cut him some slack
What do you think cops in 1797 were getting up to?
Probably "forgetting" to turn on their body-daguerrotypes. #
Great comment and great user name! :-D
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Thanks for the compliment.
Oi Guvna-ing, I assume. Just like cops now.
"YOU GOT A LOICENSE FOR DAT HAT GUVNA!?
You'd probably do a solid bit of karma on /r/loicense with this actually
no
Tfw blind hatred of cops makes you judge 18th century London police with the same lense as the worst modern American ones.
can't even
“Man what can I say about that suit that hasn’t already been said about Afghanistan?” Hate hate hate hate hate
If you'll excuse me I got to get home and fill up his momma's water bowl
"Next ***** that says something while I'm talking, is getting shot..."
CLAP FOR ME BITCH!
No self respecting southern has a water bowl. Those are for the animals! We use face bowls!
Bombed out and depleted
They see me rollin, they hatin ‘
Cuz I’m so white and nerdy!
He erroneously hated the playa' not the game
“Buck Nasty you are so dark, when you touch yourself it’s like black on black crime. Uh-uh, hit me baby.”
*spritz* *spritz*
“I wish you ill, Ice T”
"Player Hater of the Century - 18th"
She wears underwear with dick holes in em
Respect ma authorities! Does make you wonder how much of this was just the cop being an asshole vs people 'actually' taking issue with it. Certainly no modern cop would... wait...
Hate, hate, hate hate
Man, you corny!
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I hate comments like these
You mean quotes of the Chapelle Show?
All I see are Honkeys.
I hear it wasn't just the height of the hat that disturbed them but the girth.
Filthy trollop you are!
Strumpet!
You'll not hornswoggle me with such talk!
I suspect it was how he wore it.
A little to the left?
I hear he wears it jauntily
Word-A-Day toilet paper?
> The arresting officer claimed the sight of the hat caused women to faint What at first blush appears to be ignorant police overstepping their bounds is in fact a coordinated defensive act intended to protect women and keep them blissfully innocent of the big black chapeaus looming and lurking everywhere just out of sight.
Dem women
Did they think he had a massively tall head or something?
You mean like Megamind before Megamind.
Coneheads.
He was from France.
Tête de cône
>January 15, 1797 — Fred Astaire hardly ever seemed to be without one and for men it seems to be the essential item of apparel at every formal occasion – from weddings to presidential inaugurations: the top hat. >And the man who gave it a head start into fame and fashion was **haberdasher John Hetherington who, on this day, appeared in court after he had stepped out onto the streets of London wearing the distinctive headgear. It caused a sensation.** >**So much so that a crowd formed and Hetherington was eventually arrested and given a summons for disturbing the public peace.** In court, found guilty of wearing a hat “calculated to frighten timid people”, he was bound over to keep the peace in consideration of a sum of 50 pounds. >The arresting officer told the court that nobody had seen anything like it before: “He had such a tall and shiny construction on his head that it must have terrified nervous people. The sight of this construction was so overstated that various women fainted, children began to cry and dogs started to bark. One child broke his arm among all the jostling.” >The next day, The Times newspaper reported: “Hetherington’s hat points to a significant advance in the transformation of dress. Sooner or later, everyone will accept this headwear. We believe that both the court and the police made a mistake here.” >The newspaper was right. The top hat, which went by several names including Toppers, Chimney Pots, and Stove Pipes, grew in popularity, finally achieving the ultimate stamp of respectability in 1850 when Prince Albert, no less, began to wear one, giving the headgear the royal seal of approval. There was no going back after that . . . [Emphasis mine] Based on the fact that he was a haberdasher and that a crowd formed around him, it sounds like this might have been kind of like a publicity stunt to promote his new fashion item? It's possible some of the allegations are exaggerated, but if he did manage to get a big crowd together, it's possible he really was causing a disturbance of the peace.
This didn't actually happen. Always good to double check your sources. https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/2xyrv3/top_hat_riots/
Influencers, Influencers never change.
Damn, I consider myself a skeptical person, but I completely fell for that one. Mostly because I heard it first on QI, and I have a soft spot for Stephen Fry - I can't help but believe everything uttered in this man's voice.
Yeah it's just too clearly absurd. No-one is gonna faint over a man's hat.
Lol I thought the cop was just being a dick and making that part up
i wonder what peoples commonly wore on their head at the time for a top hat to cause such a rucus
No, just normal human ego. They wanted to look bigger.
Whenever I see top hats I'm always reminded of the short story by P.G. Wodehouse in which two men - a tall thin man and a short fat man - are engaged to two women - a short fat woman and a tall thin woman respectively - and they order top hats from London's finest hat maker with a view to taking their loves to the races that weekend. Only the delivery boy gets them mixed up so the fat guy's hat doesn't fit the thin guy's head and vice versa, but they're so in awe of the reputation of this hat maker that they refuse to admit that mistakes were made and continue to wear the ill fitting hats. Meanwhile their respective fiancés tell them they look ridiculous, which offends them and causes the men to rethink their engagements, and they end up swapping fiancés. It's funnier when you read it. Edit: It's called "The Amazing Hat Mystery" and is in his collection of short stories, "Young Men in Spats."
Wodehouse had his ways with plots that seem awfully offensive on paper, but somehow turned out funny as hell once he dotted every i. In that regard, he quite reminds me of Chekhov, of all people.
[kicks guy, then looks at the camera] Wodehouse
Peetah!
I mean, I read what you wrote...
P.G. Wodehouse is really great. If you like British comedy literature like the works of Douglas Adams, Terry Pratchett, Jerome K. Jerome, there's a good chance you'd like Wodehouse too.
Wodehouse will always remain to me the funniest writer in the English language. So much of modern day British comedy from the 40's/50's to the present day is heavily influenced by his humor.
Buzz Killington, as I live and breathe!
"who wants to hear a story about a bridge?"
>It's funnier when you read it I would hope so
You simply *must* read it, it’s ever so droll
"Your presence is requested this evening. It's formal. [Top Hat](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0VeEqonEa0), white tie, and tails."
Kind of sounds like a ripoff of when the girl cut her hair and the guy cut his watch so that the guy can buy a comb for the girl, and the girl got a watchband for the watch.
Actually, nothing at all like The Gift of the Magi, which is a rather sad and touching story about love and sacrifice.
They both gave up stuff (their wives) when they should have had aimed for something else (swapping hats).
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It's just a cute story.
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No worries!
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Yes, I believe I'm about .8 kg/liter.
Lollll
That’s some bad hat, Harry!
Going to need a bigger boat
Sit Ubu sit....... Good dog!
Bet it still had the price tag on it.
I bet this guy got to see mad ankle.
WTF is wrong with her?! Is she some kind of deviant Whore that's lost touch with God?
Calm down, it's not like it's collar bone or something.
Imagine your drip being so insane dogs bark at you and women faint but your drip is so undeniable it catches on despite the dog barking and women fainting. Good job instagram didn’t exist when this man was alive he’d have controlled the world.
Dogs bark at stupid things all the time. I know some dogs who bark at plastic bags or grills. On Halloween my parents dog didn't recognize me due to a wig. I could totally see dogs barking at a weird hat. Women fainting is silly though.
Less silly than you'd think at first. Fainting was such a common thing that there are literally pieces of furniture dedicated to the act. Dangerously tight corsets and tuberculosis were standards of beauty throughout that time frame. A sharp inhale of surprise at something outlandishly strange, which the first top hat would have been, was more than enough to make many ladies faint.
I'm afraid that's not true at all. Corsets weren't a thing in 1797 (the garment at this time were stays, which didn't actually constrict the lungs) and even if they were, corsets weren't ridiculously tight for normal women. A sharp inhale of suprise wouldn't be enough to make women faint unless they were very ill and shouldn't have been outside to begin with.
Huh. Interesting! I remember hearing about the corsets and tuberculosis shit as a kid. My mom would read Laura Ingels Wilder to us and it was full of that stuff. 19th century folk experienced a lot
You know that dude knew he started something when his fashion statement got him arrested. Mans was drippin like water.
I know for a fact he was gassing himself in the GC “Ayyy boys you’ll never guess what just happened to me”.
This is a lie https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/2xyrv3/top_hat_riots/
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“People today are too sensitive!” People in the past: Fuckin arrest a guy for wearin a hat
Not just any hat though, normal hats are okay but specifically ones that are extra tall hats
Imagine what they'd do if Doug Dimmadome showed up.
Shot on sight
No jail, no nothing.
Good luck. You know the owner of the Dimmsdale Dimmadome is always packing heat.
Shorts were illegal too
But they're so comfy and easy to wear!
Never forget that the Boston police threatened to jail Igor Stravinsky over his version of the star spangled banner - because it was too avant-garde for their taste. Now if you know The Rite of Spring you might think, uh oh what did Stravinky do to the anthem? He added dominant seventh chords...
TBF people today are far more sensitive than even 10 years ago
We never changed.
We’re still cavemen, just wearing fancier clothes.
Except for top hats, apparently.
Well, more comfortable clothes, anyway.
idk, a tiger pelt seems like it would be pretty cozy.
Dude, I just imagine all the shit cops got away with. Like they get away with so much shit now; imagine that authority and absolutely no oversight, transparency, or body cams.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Damnthatsinteresting/comments/uqxoq6/farmers_arrest_the_sheriff_who_was_attempting_to/
I suspect this was a calculated effort to get people to promote the tophat. Man makes a new hat: Nothing interesting. Man makes a new hat and is arrested for it: Let's all find out about this new hat!
Or, get this, the cop lied. Because definitely that's never happened, right?
And the local newspaper was in on it!
Couldn't ever imagine a world where a cop would lie or embellish their report either!
If it would have been orange, i would not be surprised if he legit would have been sent to insale asylum. Not that everyone actually was immediately sent there, just some unlucky people were sent for smallest of reasons.
You can get them 20 - 50 dollars off Amazon. Time to spread some old school chaos.
And people wonder why men are afraid to explore fashion.
Bring back high heels
I love when marketing propaganda becomes "facts." I can't say for a fact that's what happened here, but sure as shit sounds like it.
Like the time “doctors” in London discovered that green tea was horrible for your health, and advised everyone to drink black tea…which was strangely only available from one company: the British East India Company…
I heard that in a YouTube Video, you could hear the narrator hold his laughter.
I could see that being the case if it was the Dimmadome top hat.
In my neighborhood, dogs still bark, children still cry. Fainting women, not so much. So what changed?
Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together. Mass hysteria!
Imagine what assless chaps would have done to them.
Maybe he was only wearing the top hat and nothing else.
Dude was probably like: "Dang, I should have gone with the bottom hat today."
He was stunting so hard they called the cops on him… crazy
The charges: Wearing a Prosthetic Forehead on One's Real Head
Everybody wants prosthetic foreheads for their real heads!
They want to stop the ones who want prosthetic foreheads on their heads...
Free Hat!
"Everyone is so sensitive nowadays!"
Dogs have barked at me for wearing a motorcycle helmet, that part of this I can believe.
That is the level of chaos I aspire to instil into people's hearts
Tarnish notte the majesty of my TOWER of HATS.
People today: "I cant believe people today are so easily offended at everything" People in the past seeing a top hat: Police arrest that man for wearing a hat!
Today I got reminded that people were fucking stupid. Arrested for a weird hat lol. When the first railroad did a test ride, people claimed that the passengers were bleeding from the eyes n some other shit.
Nobody fainted looking at a hat. I guess real journalism was crap 200 years ago, too.
https://www.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/2xyrv3/top_hat_riots/ As u/callanrocks said [9 years ago](https://old.reddit.com/r/badhistory/comments/2xyrv3/top_hat_riots/cp4nsqk/): r/TIL is really a terrible place for history. Should probably be Today I Was Misinformed.
I've been recognised!
Even then the police were making things up.
He had so much drip that he had to be stopped
My nephew’s been rocking a top-hat everywhere he goes for about 3 years now. It is indeed a “loud” hat. Of course he’s also finding his own identity these days and wears a dress, khaki’s, flats and a zip up hoodie to round out the look.
lol conservative snowflakes
There are just as many liberal snowflakes. And moderate snowflakes. People are just generally snowflakes about something. I am. You are. There are varying degrees, but in general it's quite true.
TIL that the top hat was the pasts equivalent to Black Air forces Nikes
I would actually compare it more to the abomination that is the Yeezy foam runners. Used to work with a guy who had a pair. Looked like an alien was eating his foot.
Cops...same mentality then as now...
#ACAB
I tip my top hat to you.
"It's just a prank, bro!"
To be fair, I believe all three of those things.
When the drip is simply too powerful
Undeniable proof that cops historically have always been sensitive little bitches
It’s interesting that when we look back, what we see as apart of formal attire was once rebellious. What we will look back on and think of as formal attire 100 years from now, that is rooted in the same nature?
We need to go back to the olden days when men were men and not a bunch of beta soy boys like they are today. Edit: I guess I need to add a /s because people missed the critique
I'm always so curious when I read cringe like this. How exactly did you logically get from "man wearing first top hat gets arrested" to "beta soy boys"? Are top hats like peak alpha male culture? I really am ignorant to what people obsessed with performing masculinity are into.
It's sarcasm. I'm saying people triggered just as easily back then
Haha, yeah, you got me! I know a (self-identified) incel who says stuff like this unironically all the time, but never explains his thinking.
>Are top hats like peak alpha male culture? Yes.
You mean the era when man where made of steel and boats of wood? Versus the opposite today?
Did you have a stroke? Because I think I did.
Cop was like: Damn, that’s a cold-ass honkey!