Planet Cardigan

Another day, another post. I thought I'd expand a little on yesterday's topic, the letter or letterman cardigan.
These are a uniquely American phenomenon and intended basically as billboards to display one's school award letters. Chenille letters were awarded by schools for participation in sporting activities; this was later extended to other activities such as music or drama. One can only speculate what the one which illustrates yesterday's post was awarded for!*

They seem to date back, in cardigan form, to the thirties or perhaps a little earlier, before that they were pullover style. The older ones are made of wool, quite thick and cleverly combining all the weight, suppleness and sheer erotic allure of the trench coat (in the case of the last of these qualities, none at all; sorry trench coat fanciers, this is a cardigan blog). They were succeeded by the letterman jacket, which we would probably call the baseball jacket.

I gather it was considered a mark of some intimacy for a boy to give his letter cardigan to his girlfriend so that she might become a billboard for his sporting prowess. Are we getting any nearer to an idea of what the one illustrated above might have been  awarded for?**

Here in the UK our exposure to them will probably have been mostly through Happy Days when it made it to our television screens in the mid seventies. By this time wool was out and acrylic was in, for he most part with five buttons instead of six, made of shiny semi-translucent plastic (slobber..).

The acrylic ones are machine washable, though why I (or you) should find that interesting I can't imagine.

They're still available, though these days considered costume items rather than practical everyday wear. I don't think they were ever considered sleepwear or erotic, except by me.

http://www.bristolproducts.com/sweaters/Gallery%201/41.html

and

http://www.mountolympusawards.com/ph/lettermansweater.htm

among others. They can be found on EBay too.

I particularly like the white ones.

Thank you for your time, feel free to reread, there'll be a test next week.


*I don't think finishing a sentence with a preposition has ever warranted an award in America or anywhere else.
**Strike two as they would say in its country of origin.