“Hurry son! You’ll be late for school!”
“I’m trying Mom. I can’t get my pants on. I think the pants legs shrunk!”
Such might have been a morning conversation in any number of homes in the 1950’s. That’s because a certain fad called pegged pants swept all of Boomerhood, causing both young men and women to truly struggle in order to get their pants on.
Pegged pants had their origins when teenagers began rolling up the cuffs on their jeans during the “Jitterbug Days.” By rolling up the pants legs, the jeans fit more snugly at the ankles The more you rolled up the cuffs, the tighter they became, and for some reason, we thought that was cool. But Boomers were never ones to leave well enough alone. We began having our pant legs bottoms “permanently pegged.”
That meant a trip to the local seamstress – sometimes a mom in the neighborhood with a Singer Sewing Machine – and an order for 7-inch cuff bottoms. Not 7 inches in diameter, meaning a total of 14-inches at the bottom, but 7-inches in total circumference. That meant that somehow, a young Boomer had to stick a size 10 or larger foot through a hole not much wider than a shirtsleeve cuff. This unique feat required foot contortions the envy of many in the Barnum & Bailey Circus. Getting pegged pants off at night often required the assistance of a younger brother or sister.
It was never easy, but coolness had its price, and that price was that for about 5 years, young Boomers went through hell to get their pants on and off.