I'm not much of a hat guy, usually preferring to keep my top open to the heavens so I won't miss something important, but I recognize the wisdom in occasionally putting a cap on the old dome.
It's often a good idea, for instance, to reduce the 60 percent of your body heat that leaks from the head, to try to stay dry in sleet, to erect a small defense against black flies and mosquitoes, and to hide beneath a mobile source of shade when an intense sun is raining showers of ultraviolet B.
Hats can also make a powerful fashion statement. On the waters where I spend most of my time it has become de rigueur among young paddlers to wear a baseball cap backwards, which seems a pretty good way to avoid sunburn on the nape of the neck but neglects the nose and cheeks. A more sensible choice--and a fashion statement of its own--might be a full-brimmed hat like the Tilly Endurable.
Now that's a hat. Ten-ounce cotton duck. Pre-shrunk, water repellent. Doesn't lose its shape with use. Tough enough to swat out a brush fire. Has an appealing woodsy look but is advertised in The New Yorker. The manufacturer claims it is "the best, most practical outdoor hat in the world," which they obviously believe since the hat is guaranteed for the life of the wearer. Anyone who owns a Tilly tends to become attached to it.
People have always had a special attachment to hats, especially fishermen, perhaps because they play such an intimate role in the images we create for ourselves. Hats advertise character, announcing to the world that we're adventurers, rebels, conservatives, or jocks. They're also a good way to cover up baldness and bad hair and they add a few inches of height. They're among the initial things you notice about a person from a distance, contributing much to that all-important first impression.
A passion for hats was in part responsible for inspiring Europeans to climb into bark canoes and explore the Old Northwest during the 17th and 18th centuries. The French-Canadian voyageurs of that era left Montreal, skirted the Great Lakes, and journeyed farther and farther into the wilderness to the west and north in order to trade rifles, axes, and whisky for beaver pelts. The pelts were returned to Montreal and shipped across the Atlantic to feed a seemingly insatiable hunger for beaver hats of one sort or another, which for a century and a half were all the rage in the salons and ballrooms of England, France, and Germany.
Judging from paintings I've seen, the voyageurs themselves wore a variety of hats, ranging from bandannas to floppy cowboylike styles to a sort of fez adorned with a bright sash and feather. The main idea then as now was to keep water off the skull and keep the head warm in the cold, but you can tell there was a lot of fashion consciousness even in those 35-foot cargo canoes.
I suppose I'm waiting to find the perfect hat. The Tilly comes close, but it doesn't get around a basic shortcoming. I like to feel the wind in my hair and the hot breath of the sun on my scalp and I don't mind a little rain. In cold weather or a downpour or when the mosquitoes are bad, sure, I'll relent and put on whatever's at hand. If it's a baseball cap and I'm in the mood to make a statement I'll even wear it backwards.
Copyright (c) 1996 Jerry Dennis. All rights reserved.