Going Civilian: The Suit and How to Find One

      The focus of most reenacting tends to be military, and thus most reenactors tend to have an almost exclusive military wardrobe; and that makes sense since most events are military. There are some who do civilian though, and many of whom I know in the reenacting community, and even many outside of it, wouldn't mind having some period civilian suits in their wardrobe. There is a problem though; because most reenacting is military, there is much more military clothing available, since reproductions are being made. This is not the case with a civilian clothing however.

    The difficulty of getting civvies is finding them for a decent price, in your size and in good condition. They don't have to be perfect, since you can just take them somewhere and get a suit repaired, but too many holes becomes noticeable, as well as tearing or fraying, especially on formalwear. The key to finding a good period suit is patience and a keen eye; many are way too expensive(1930s and 40s suits sell for a lot)or too small, so waiting for one in your size and the right price can take some looking around. And since I just mentioned size...

    It's really beneficial to know your measurements; your inseam, waist size, shoulders, chest, arm length, etc. You can go to a department store, like a Macy's or J.C. Penney, and they'll measure you for free, or just do it yourself. Most older suits are not marked with a size, so you'll either have to try it on, or you'll have to find them online. Sellers usually list the measurements, some even the actual sizes, which is nice. If something is too big, you can always get it tailored, but too small is an issue, unless you just need to lose some excess weight(and no, I don't mean starving yourself, I mean if you just need to get into shape).

     Now, the places to actually find a period suit can vary an awful lot; every blue moon, local thrift stores might have something, but the best route is usually eBay or a specialty store, like Memories: Vintage Clothing & Jewelry, which sells early and mid-20th Century clothing and accessories. It's probably one of the best places I've been to. Other places to look for period clothing would be events; some reenactments or historical events sell period clothing, usually from private vendors.

     One of the biggest places for this, and one of my favorite is WWII Weekend at the Mid-Atlantic Air Museum in Reading, PA. This particular event lasts for 3 days, and is the largest WWII event on the East-Coast to my knowledge. There are many, many vendors, including Memories: Vintage Clothing & Jewelry, along with many others who sell furniture, clothing and memorabilia. The event itself consists of not only these shops and vendors, but also entertainment from radio performers for live audiences, evening dances with a live orchestra, singers, reenactors, military camps, period towns, original airplanes and rides, demonstrations, as well as much much more. One of the biggest highlights, perhaps the biggest, is having veterans from WWII there, which gives this event something very special; the chance to talk with them is priceless, and a great honor.

     So now that we've gone through the basics, knowing what you want,  knowing your measurements, knowing where to look(or some tips on the types of places to go to) and finding a good suit, I think anyone interested should be set. This is just the start though, I still have to talk about hats, shoes, ties and other, as well as some of the specifics of suits themselves, but that will be for future posts! Right now I think we have enough of the basics to get a start.

     If anyone has any input, questions, corrections or advice, feel free to comment below!

Differences in Time: Marriage, Salary and Dollar Value

Here is a chart with some of the differences between living in 1940-2010; differences in age of marriage, cost of cars, average wage and the inflation of the dollar. I got most of the information from , but also from the U.S. Census Bureau. Let it be noted that while some things may be an equivalent cost in today's money, even though the wages were lower in earlier time periods, people tended not buy as much stuff as we do now in general, and smaller items, such as milk and gas, were more inexpensive even with inflation costs accounted for.

Attitudes on Artificial Intelligence and how they have changed.

     Today, people tend to view artificial intelligence as a positive technology investment towards the future; a future filled with machines that can on some level, think for themselves and help humanity progress towards greater technological advances, as well as do tasks that humans would prefer not to do. There are some who dissent, but most seem to be on the band wagon for creating robots or computers that are more independent from human involvement, but not control.

     Modern examples of negative perception of A.I. are portrayed in such movies as The Matrix and The Terminator, with more balanced views being portrayed through I, Robot, showing both the negative and positive sides to A.I. Obviously in Star Wars, the culture is shown to be ingrained with robots, though mostly as servants, and in Star Trek, the technology is still new, for androids, but is shown to be positive most of the time. In Metropolis, humans have become reliant on machines, without which society would break down into anarchy, and soon does after the machines are broken down. The fear being that society will become too used to technology doing things for them so that they forget how to do things for themselves; though this is not the main focus on Metropolis, it is an interesting aspect; a more clear picture of this would be in Star Trek: The Original Series, where there is a race of aliens that has since died out because of their reliance on technology; they eventually forgot how to operate the very machines their people had built, so they started to dwindle.

      Throughout the past, there seems to be a caution of advancing too quickly or getting used to machines, an over reliance, and to not forget how to do things for ourselves. This seems to be an attitude which is disappearing, as people rely more and more on computers and cell phones, along with other such technology. As people become more reliant on technology, other skills seem to be disappearing, such as, critical thinking, writing skills, grammatical skills, social interaction skills, quickness of mind(like mathematical skills, reading a clock, remembering something rather than having to look it up, etc.).

      All in all, technological advancement is good, however should be treated with prudence. Advancement should also not be held back because of profit; the technology for more efficient engines has been available for years now, however, because putting more advanced engines in cars would mean less money spent on gasoline and oil, and also less sales on less efficient engines, auto-companies keep technology from advancing and thus we don't have nearly the same kind of progress that was seen in the early part of the 20th Century, as compared with the early part of the 21st Century. This kind of attitude, one of profit, does not look into long term profit; when more technological advances are made, there are new things to make new profits off of, new focuses that can have equal or more money made. Another such example would be the lightbulb; the technology exists for a longer laster, better and brighter burning, more energy efficient lightbulb(thanks to Tesla), however, it is not used because it is too efficient; rather than selling these lightbulbs and looking into other areas of profit in technology, the technology is held back in order to make a short term profit, rather than sell a few advanced pieces of technology alongside things that people will need more regular replacements for. It's known as planned obsolescence.

      To delve more deeply into that topic however, would be for another post entirely, but it does affect technological advances, which is what this post is about overall. People do seem to rely on technology slightly too much, and the way modern attitudes are going, more reliance seems to be the way of the future, which if we are not careful of, we shall become a people unable to sufficiently operate without technology, which in the event of a loss of that technology, there will be few if any prepared for the fallout.