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A deerstalker is a type of cap that is typically worn in rural areas, often for hunting, especially deer stalking. Because of the cap's popular association with the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes, [1] it has become stereotypical headgear for a detective, especially in comical drawings or cartoons along with farcical plays and films. [2]
According to Sean M. Wright, writer and member of The Baker Street Irregulars ("The Manor House Case"), who has constructed dozens of them, the deerstalker is most often made of cloth, often light or heavy wool tweed, although deerstalkers made of suede, white cotton duck, and even fur or denim are not unknown. "I even made one for the late Los Angeles attorney Robert Landon Kirste," said Sean, "who asked me to make a deerstalker of black velvet for formal occasions. When I asked if he wanted white ribbon to tie the earflaps, he demurred. 'I don't want to stand out,' he explained.”[ citation needed ]
The cap is made of six (or eight) triangular panels with rounded sides, which are sewn together. If the sides of the panels are cut in a way giving them slightly rounded shoulders midway, the crown will become more squared and flatter rather than hemispherical. The cap may be deep or shallow, barely touching the tops of the ears, according to the whim of the hatter. Either way, it is usually lined with an inner cap of satin, polished cotton, or similar lining fabrics. Occasionally, one can find a deerstalker with a lightly quilted satin lining.
The deerstalker's defining feature is a pair of semicircular bills or visors worn in front and rear. The dual bills provide protection from the sun for the face and neck of the wearer during extended periods outdoors, such as for hunting or fishing. These are usually stiffened with pasteboard, cardboard, or layers of heavy canvas. For a brief period during the 1970s, some deerstalkers were manufactured with bills stiffened by the steam-cooked and pressure-molded wood-fiber construct called Masonite. The Masonite tended to crack and break into segments, and over time, was also apt to crumble at the corners.
Along with its visors, a deerstalker often, though not essentially, has a pair of unstiffened cloth earflaps attached to either side of the cap. These are tied together by grosgrain ribbons or by laces or, very occasionally, held together by snaps or a button. The earflaps, tied under the chin, provide protection in cold weather and high winds. They are otherwise tied together above the crown to keep them out of the way.
Deerstalkers may be made of solid-coloured material, but they are most often found with houndstooth check, herringbone, or plaid patterns in the twill of a fabric that serves as camouflage. Modern hunting clothes, including deerstalkers, are often made with either a red-and-black or an orange-and-black check pattern or tweed for both this purpose and hunter safety, not least in actual deer stalking, for which purpose milliners originally constructed[ when? ] this type of cap.
The "sportsman's deerstalker" is made with a brim around the cap, narrow at the sides, but which may be elongated in front or back, omitting the separate double bills. The earflaps are also eliminated. Some types of this cap sport a hatband fashioned from the same material around the crown. The "flapless" version can be easily folded for convenient carrying.
The variants of the "Irish" style deerstalker are minor but significant. The cap is fronted with a cloth panel instead of the usual seam. The earflaps, wide and triangular in the standard version, are narrow with straight sides. The usual semicircular visors may be replaced by short, rectangular bills. George C. Scott wore this type of deerstalker as a jurist who imagines himself to be Sherlock Holmes in the 1971 film They Might be Giants.
Also, a reversible deerstalker is made that looks like the standard, double-billed model, but it can be turned inside out, revealing an entirely different fabric or even suede, with the contrasting earflaps of the original fabric turned backward and tied together. Other caps with earflaps, e.g. "trapper" and "ushanka", are not considered deerstalkers, as they lack fore and aft symmetrical bills, the defining feature of a deerstalker cap.
The deerstalker cap is also known as a "fore-and-aft" cap in reference to its front and rear bills. This headgear is also called a "tweed helmet", due to its resemblance in design to the balaclava helmet worn by officers in the British army during the Crimean War. It has no connection to the pith helmet.
Because the detective is often depicted wearing a deerstalker in books and theatrical and television films, some people call the cap a "Sherlock".
The most famous wearer of a deerstalker is the fictional character Sherlock Holmes, who is popularly depicted as favouring this style of cap. [3] Holmes is never explicitly described as wearing a deerstalker by name in Arthur Conan Doyle's stories, although in "The Adventure of Silver Blaze", the narrator, Dr. Watson, describes him as wearing "his ear-flapped travelling cap", [4] and in "The Boscombe Valley Mystery", as wearing a "close-fitting cloth cap". [5] As the deerstalker is the most typical cap of the period matching both descriptions, not surprisingly, the original illustrations for the stories by Sidney Paget (who favored a deerstalker himself) in the United Kingdom, and Frederic Dorr Steele in the United States, along with other illustrators of the period, depicted Holmes as a "deerstalker man", which then became the popular perception of him.
Later, less-informed depictions of Holmes have him wearing this cap in the city, failing to take into account the fact that the fashion-conscious Holmes would be loath to commit such a sartorial faux pas; the deerstalker is traditionally a rural outdoorsman's cap. [6] It is not appropriate headgear for the properly dressed urban gentleman. Still, while contemporaneous illustrators portrayed Holmes as wearing a deerstalker in the proper setting for such attire, travelling cross-country or operating in a rural outdoor setting, Paget chose to depict Holmes as wearing the deerstalker in London while keeping vigil for the appearance of the murderous Colonel Sebastian Moran in illustrations made for "The Empty House" when the story first appeared in The Strand Magazine in 1904. [7] This is uncharacteristic of Paget, who most often depicts Holmes wearing a black top hat and frock coat in the city, as shown in the Regent Street scene in The Hound of the Baskervilles , or sporting a black bowler when wearing a black or plaid Inverness cape (or, more accurately, a macfarlane cape-coat) as seen in his illustrations for "The Blue Carbuncle" and "The Musgrave Ritual", respectively. [8]
Adrian Malcolm Conan Doyle was the youngest son of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and his second wife Jean, Lady Doyle or Lady Conan Doyle. He had two siblings, sister Jean Conan Doyle and brother Denis, as well as two half-siblings, sister Mary and brother Kingsley.
A cap is a flat headgear, usually with a visor. Caps have crowns that fit very close to the head. They made their first appearance as early as 3200 BC. The origin of the word "cap" comes from the Old French word "chapeau" which means "head covering". Over time, the word has evolved and changed its meaning, but it still retains its association with headwear. Caps typically have a visor, or no brim at all. They are popular in casual and informal settings, and are seen in sports and fashion. They are typically designed for warmth, and often incorporate a visor to block sunlight from the eyes. They come in many shapes, sizes, and are of different brands. Baseball caps are one of the most common types of cap.
"The Boscombe Valley Mystery", one of the fifty-six short Sherlock Holmes stories written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, is the fourth of the twelve stories in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. It was first published in the Strand Magazine in October 1891.
A batting helmet is worn by batters in the game of baseball or softball. It is meant to protect the batter's head from errant pitches thrown by the pitcher. A batter who is "hit by pitch," due to an inadvertent wild pitch or by intent, may be seriously, even fatally, injured.
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes is a collection of short stories by British writer Arthur Conan Doyle, first published on 14 October 1892. It contains the earliest short stories featuring the consulting detective Sherlock Holmes, which had been published in twelve monthly issues of The Strand Magazine from July 1891 to June 1892. The stories are collected in the same sequence, which is not supported by any fictional chronology. The only characters common to all twelve are Holmes and Dr. Watson, and all are related in first-person narrative from Watson's point of view.
The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes is a collection of short stories by British writer Arthur Conan Doyle, first published late in 1893 with 1894 date. It was first published in the UK by G. Newnes Ltd., and was published in the US by Harper & Brothers in February 1894. It was the second collection featuring the consulting detective Sherlock Holmes, following The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes. Like the first it was illustrated by Sidney Paget.
An ushanka, also called an ushanka-hat, is a Russian fur hat with ear-covering flaps that can be tied up on the crown of the cap, or fastened at the chin to protect the ears, jaw, and lower chin from the cold. An alternative way to wear is to bend the flaps back and tie them behind the head, which is called "ski-style" — this offers less protection from the elements, but much better visibility, essential for high-speed skiing. The dense fur also offers some protection against blunt impacts to the head. They are also traditionally worn in the Baltic region including Sweden, Finland, Norway and the whole eastern European region.
Sidney Edward Paget was a British artist of the Victorian era, best known for his illustrations that accompanied Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories in The Strand Magazine.
Sherlock Holmes has long been a popular character for pastiche, Holmes-related work by authors and creators other than Arthur Conan Doyle. Their works can be grouped into four broad categories:
The custodian helmet is a type of helmet worn predominantly by male police officers in the United Kingdom and within certain other places around the world. First used by the Metropolitan Police in London in 1863, the BBC labelled the custodian helmet a "symbol of British law enforcement". They are worn by male constables and sergeants on foot patrol. A cultural icon, it has featured in films, TV series and other media involving British police.
The Inverness cape is a form of weatherproof outer-coat. It is notable for being sleeveless, the arms emerging from armscyes beneath a cape.
Traditionally, the canon of Sherlock Holmes consists of the 56 short stories and four novels written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. In this context, the term "canon" is an attempt to distinguish between Doyle's original works and subsequent works by other authors using the same characters. Usually capitalized by fans of the Sherlockian game as "the Canon", the description of these 60 adventures as the Sherlock Holmes canon and the game of applying the methods of "Higher Criticism" to it was started by Ronald Knox as a playful use of the traditional definition of canon as an authoritative list of books accepted as holy scripture.
The Ulster is a Victorian working daytime overcoat, with a cape and sleeves.
Adventures of Sherlock Holmes; or, Held for Ransom is a 1905 American silent film directed by J. Stuart Blackton for Vitagraph Studios. It was the second film based on Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories, following the 1900 Mutoscope trick film Sherlock Holmes Baffled, and is usually regarded as the first attempt to film a "serious" Holmes adaptation. The scenario was by Theodore Liebler based on elements of Conan Doyle's 1890 novel The Sign of the Four.
Headgear, headwear, or headdress is any element of clothing which is worn on one's head, including hats, helmets, turbans and many other types. Headgear is worn for many purposes, including protection against the elements, decoration, or for religious or cultural reasons, including social conventions.
Sherlock Holmes is a four-act play by William Gillette and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, based on Conan Doyle's character Sherlock Holmes. After three previews it premiered on Broadway November 6, 1899, at the Garrick Theatre in New York City.
A statue of Sherlock Holmes by the sculptor John Doubleday stands near the supposed site of 221B Baker Street, the fictional detective's address in London. Unveiled on 23 September 1999, the sculpture was funded by the Abbey National building society, whose headquarters were on the purported site of the famous address. As no site was available on Baker Street itself the statue was installed outside Baker Street tube station, on Marylebone Road. Doubleday had previously produced a statue of Holmes for the town of Meiringen in Switzerland, below the Reichenbach Falls whence the detective fell to his apparent death in the 1893 story "The Final Problem".
Sherlock Holmes fandom is an international, informal community of fans of the stories by Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes. The fans are known as Sherlockians or Holmesians. Many fans of Sherlock Holmes participate in societies around the world, and engage in a variety of activities such as discussion, tourism, and collecting.
Sherlock Holmes is the overall title given to the series of radio dramas adapted from Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories that aired between 1952 and 1969 on BBC radio stations. The episodes starred Carleton Hobbs as Sherlock Holmes and Norman Shelley as Dr. Watson. All but four of Doyle's sixty Sherlock Holmes stories were adapted with Hobbs and Shelley in the leading roles, and some of the stories were adapted more than once with different supporting actors.
Media related to Deerstalkers (headgear) at Wikimedia Commons
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