Hello, and welcome to The Bookmark.

I'm Christine Brown, your host today.

My guest is James Griffin, author of "Pressed, Clean, and Properly Fitted: A Photographic History of the Texas A&M University Corps of Cadets Uniform."

James, thank you so much for being here today.

- -I'm delighted to be here, Christine.

- -That title is a mouthful, and I also think it pretty much tells us what the book's about.

But I'm going to still ask you if you will introduce the book to us.

- -Well, this is indeed a photographic history of the Texas A&M Corps of Cadets uniform.

The idea of this book was to lay out the entire history of the Corps of Cadets uniform from the beginning in 1876, and take that all the way to the present.

So another idea about it was to have a picture to illustrate every major point that we wanted to make about that chain of events.

So that's how we ended up with over 750 pictures in this book.

It is richly illustrated.

- -If you like your history and you like your pictures, this is the book, I have to say.

- -That's right.

- -How did you become interested in the topic?

I mean... you're a former student, so I know how you became interested in A&M, but the topic of kind of uniform history specifically.

- -Well, strangely enough, it actually goes back to my childhood, really, because my dad was class of 1938.

He saved a lot of his uniform items, from his days as a cadet, and seeing those when I was a child, as well as his outfit pictures and personal pictures - boot pictures - that got me interested in asking every possible question that I could possibly ask him about Texas A&M, the uniforms, the Corps of Cadets.

I was a kind of history minded person even as a child.

I was always asking questions about everything, about the old days, to everybody who had talked to me.

So it grew out of that, and I had not only my dad, who was in the Corps of Cadets, but I had a couple of uncles who were former Aggies.

There's never really a former Aggie, I should say Aggie-exes: class of '33 and class of '40.

I had a cousin who was class of '61, so there were plenty of Aggies to look up to in my family.

So I was interested in that all along.

And when I came here as a cadet in 1967, class of '71 is my class, I always found if I had any free time whatsoever, I would go to the library because I found out where all the yearbooks were, and I would spend a little time looking back at those pictures and studying those yearbooks.

And the uniforms always caught my eye.

I was very interested in that.

So as a cadet, I was very into that.

And I was proud to wear the uniform, obviously.

And then, about four years after I graduated, when A&M was celebrating its centennial, in 1975-76, in November of 75, the centennial edition of the Texas Aggie Magazine came out, and it had a great article in there about the history of the Corps uniform.

Walter Bradford, class of '68, had written that and illustrated it with some beautiful illustrations about the Corps uniform.

And at the end of that article he stated that he intended to write a full length book about the history of the Corps uniform.

I said to myself, "That sounds fantastic!

I can't wait to see that."

Well, unfortunately, he never got around to writing that book, so I guess it entered my head at that point.

And it it rattled around in there till after I retired from my work at Mesquite ISD as a teacher and administrator.

In 2008, I retired, and after that, I was searching in my mind for what could a- a good retirement project be?

Something to keep my mind active, to use some old historical research skills.

I did major in history here at A&M and do something like that.

So I started slowly collecting uniforms that were in addition to mine and my dad's and collecting yearbooks, just kind of building a foundation.

Well, finally, about 2016, I decided, well, let's find out if we're going to do this.

So I contacted Walter Bradford, got his address through the Association of Former Students.

I said, "I'd like to talk to you about this book and the possibility of maybe me doing it if you're not going to do it."

So I asked him to call me, and he did.

We had a great conversation.

He said, "I do have some materials I have done, some pictures that I've created to go with this book, but I have four other projects in line ahead of that.

So I'm not sure if I'm ever going to get to it."

So I said, "Well, would you mind if I had a crack at it?

Because I'd like to try it if you're not going to get to it."

And he said, "That would be great.

I have no problem with that at all.

Go for it."

And so that's what I did.

At that point, I bore down on the research.

I started going to Cushing Library and the archivists there, led by Greg Bailey at that time, helped me get into all of the documents I needed and accessed, you know, I was able to access through them the great collection of uniforms that they have at Cushing Library that Aggies have donated for their archives over the years.

Even a lot of Cadet Gray items from the very beginning.

They have a tremendous collection, so I was able to photograph some of those things.

Plus, I was able to then access, through Aggie networking, some other collections that people had, got those photographs.

So I built my collection.

I photographed that, photographed other collections and Cushing Library collection, and also then picked out historic pictures, some from Cushing's collection that haven't been in yearbooks and some that were in the yearbooks to illustrate Aggies wearing the uniforms in real time so that we could create a- a layout for people of what were the cadets wearing at any given time?

What were the flow of the changes that happened at any given time?

So we beared down on it in 2016, and I had a first draft ready in 2018.

I had it all printed out because I had laid it out in Microsoft Word.

That was the logical way for me to put it together, because I wanted to match up a picture to every point.

And so I learned how to insert pictures into a Microsoft word document.

I had to teach myself all kinds of things, Christine, which is why it was great for my brainpower.

So I had all this ready, and I had it in a notebook, and I brought it to Greg Bailey, and he looked at me and he said, "This is great."

He said, "Have you taken this to the A&M Press yet?"

And I said, "Well, no, I haven't done that yet because I wasn't sure if they were going to be interested."

I mean, I didn't write it in a purely academic style with footnotes and the whole nine yards, because I wanted it to be a coffee table book that anyone would be able to flip through and enjoy just reading it lightly, or if they wanted to read it more deeply, they could dig as deep as they wanted.

And I also included in the appendices primary source notes that I had taken in the process of this, so it really has everything in it, and it can be read from lightly all the way to very seriously, every word.

And it's going to lay out the whole history for you.

So that's sort of the way it got started and the way I proceeded.

- -I have to compliment you on the research, because I know I was I was reading this.

I could only imagine the timeline.

You must have had somewhere to to map out 150 years of- in the beginning, maybe a little more drastic changes, but as we go on, the changes become smaller and smaller.

- -Yes.

- -And to catch them and to notice them and to document them, I can only imagine the amount of paperwork and notes and things you must have had strewn about.

- -Um, yes.

You have to look clearly at the sources.

But those old yearbooks, they're great sources for that because, the old year, Aggie yearbooks from way back when, there are so many pictures, you know, it was all male, all military back in those days.

And so every picture in there, you can see, something about the uniform and, and you see all aspects of the uniform, whether it was the Aggie coveralls, who that were their fatigue uniforms back in those days in the 20s and 30s and 40s, or their Class B normal uniform or their Class A uniforms, you could see every aspect in those pictures if you really look at it.

With that in mind, you know, if you set your eye to that, you can just easily pick up, all of those details.

And as a result, I've had feedback from folks over at Cushing that this is now helping them date pictures that they that come in donated to them, and they don't know the data.

They can now use this, book as a source to help them, in some cases, narrow it down to one or 2 or 3 years.

- -That's fantastic.

- -Yeah.

- -I do want to add, too, if anybody wants to go searching through those yearbooks, you don't have to have an extensive collection anymore.

The A&M Library has digitized every single Aggie yearbook going back to the beginning.

So if you want to go find your class or find your friends or find your dad, you can do that.

And I think that's a wonderful, wonderful resource on the A&M, the libraries you've mentioned, Cushing, all the libraries here on campus do wonderful, great work to preserve our history- - -They do.

- -which is proof by this book.

Let's talk about the uniforms a little bit.

while we can.

We certainly can't cover 150 years, but you mentioned, you know, I- I feel like most of us have a picture in our heads of what a cadet uniform looks like, but as you mentioned, they originally weren't even that color.

The cadet grays were kind of the first era of a uniform.

- -That's correct.

From 1876 until 1918, Aggie cadets wore cadet gray uniforms.

Now, they weren't like West Point's in their design at first Later that did change.

Starting in 1896, One of those, you know, the cadet... the cadet gray uniforms that have the choker collar and the black trim and all of that, A&M officers began wearing those in 1896-97 and, then, all of the Aggie cadets in 1908 to 1918 wore those.

But there was an earlier cadet gray uniform that was their main one that was based on the the pattern of an 1876 Army officer's fatigue coat.

And it was just done up in cadet gray with gray pants and black trim on the pants and a gray kepi, which is a Civil War- style fatigue cap.

So that was their first real uniform.

There are a couple of others in the cadet gray era that weren't seen as frequently, but those were the main ones.

And they had a Rough Rider- style field uniform starting in about 1896-97, look like the Rough Rider style of the Army blue shirt and the gray pants and a khaki drab campaign hat that looked a lot like a cowboy hat at that- at that time, and some khaki leggings that they wore and that was all part of the cadet gray era.

But that came to an end as World War One approached because there was an increased feeling amongst the cadets that they wanted to look like the Army.

They wanted to emulate the the appearance of actual U.S.

Army soldiers.

Plus, coming up in 1916, the Congress had passed the legislation to establish the Reserve Officers Training Corps.

And so President William Bizzell thought, "Here's a way to save the cadets money and the school money.

They won't be out as much on the uniforms with the support of the government."

And so we did establish ROTC as a part of the Corps of Cadets in 1916 and that, combined with World War One, joining the war in 1917, that is what finalized the process of changing over to the Army's olive drab.

- -I feel like in the- in these first, maybe 40 to 50 years, a lot of the changes that are happening are based on what's happening in the U.S.

military.

They're borrowing elements or even copying elements, or probably because that's the style, but also maybe because they want to prepare the students for when they do graduate and join, it's kind of a seamless transition.

- -There was some of that.

Yes, there was.

interestingly, at one point in the 1920s, the Aggie cadets got ahead of the Army in adopting a dress service coat that was a turned-down collar roll and a choker collar.

Army aviators in World War One had started wearing that style of coats from the British Army because they complained about the choker collars, limiting their ability to see everything as they were flying and doing dogfighting.

And so they started wearing the British-style coats.

Well, the school decided to emulate those Army aviators, and they adopted that turn down collar coat, in 1921-22 with the same brown belts and the whole nine yards - starting to look a little bit like... more like today.

And the Army didn't officially adopt their version of that coat until 1926.

So for a while, Aggies led the style in the 1920s.

It seems strange to think about because now what we're wearing is old Army officers.

The old army officers.

- -I do want to jump a little bit ahead to the Second World War, because that's when some more uniform changes happened and I want to cover what I thought was- one of the most interesting pieces was there was a temporary boot ban- - -There was.

- -during World War Two.

- -There was.

That is something that is hard for Aggies to understand.

It's like, "how did that happen?"

Well, it was the conditions of the day.

Number one: The officers at the Trigon were really trying already before the war - before we got into the war - they were trying to get the cadets to ease themselves out of the senior boot tradition.

Army officers' wearing of dress boots like that had been stopped, except for those who were actually in mounted units in 1938.

So we had already gone past the expiration date of that.

But what they were saying was, "You need to save your money.

You don't need that when you go into service."

Especially as our entrance into the war got even closer, the commandants were saying, "You need to save money.

We ought to try to do that," but no, they would vote "keep wearing the boots."

Well, when the war actually broke out, the College Executive Committee voted in September of 1942 to stop the wearing of senior boots.

Except if you were actually in a mounted unit and you were involved in mounted instruction.

That quotation.

Well, that put a crimp on the class of '43 because they had started their senior years early in the summer because of the war time.

They were speeding it up because they wanted to get men into the war.

So there was no summer break.

They had already started speeding things up.

And so that fall, the second semester of their senior year.

Strange.

They were restricted on wearing their boots that they already had and they'd been wearing for half of the year.

But the only thing that helped them at that point was the filming of We've Never Been Licked, which happened some some scenes were shot right here on the campus, the universal movie.

And that was rare in those days to have an on location shooting.

But they did.

They came here.

And because the film was set in 1938-42, then the cadets involved in the shooting, all of these scenes for the movie could wear their boots.

And so that helped them a little bit.

But, you know, the class of '44, when they took over in January of '43 for a short period of time, they... they were not allowed to wear boots at all.

Why is this?

Well, ot only was the the situation about, well, these are old fashioned but you had restrictions that were coming - you know, leather rationing was part of that.

All the leather was going into the war effort were expanding into a force of 20 million people in the armed services, for the war, all kinds of commodities were being rationed, all kinds of things that you normally buy for your home refrigerators, washing machines, whatever.

They were all not available because, you know, even automobiles, everything was being converted to the war production.

So it was a time of sacrifice and doing without.

And so the public was, was not prone to look upon- seeing a cadet wearing senior boots, which was something fancier than active duty Army officers could wear.

An Army officer use of dress blues during World War two was not allowed, so it was just all- everything just for the war effort, nothing fancy.

And so it was the tone of the times.

But still the Aggie cadets didn't want to accept that.

And so the class of '43 cadets, who had the producers here, they got the message into the movie of how important senior boots are to Aggie cadets.

Anyone who's seen that film, you can remember several different times in there where they make really bold statements about that.

That came from those advising cadets, some of whom I met more than 50 years ago and had a conversation with.

Because, again, I always ask questions.

You know, I always ask those questions about the old times.

And when I found out they were class of '43, I had some questions.

I said, "Were you happy with how they portrayed everything?"

"Yes, we were," they said.

And only later, when I did this research that I realized the full scope of what they were meaning by that statement.

So that was my biggest surprise.

- -Yeah, that was a fun little thing to learn.

Of course, we all know the boots... The boots came back.

- -They did!

- -They can't keep the Aggies and their boots apart.

One thing you talk about in the book is- and because by about 1945, after the war, we kind of have the basic model for what- I mean, there are still changes, of course, but the basic idea and look of the uniform is pretty solidified.

- -Yes.

- -And because of that, you write in the book about how an Aggie today, in the cadet- in the Corps, a cadet today is going to have a similar experience as a corps member... my grandfather in 1955.

And what a unique... you know, there's not a lot of things - a lot of other college students are going to have in common with somebody who graduated in the 50s.

But if you're in the Corps of Cadets, you have a direct line of that history.

And what a gift, what a piece, what a wonderful thing to treasure.

- -It's really something that's very special because it can bond together all ages across the generation have had that experience.

You know, if you've been in the Corps for four years and you're, you know, and you're alive today, no matter how old you are, you can relate to the ones who are right now walking around in those boots.

You know what it feels like; you did it.

You polished those boots.

You know what it feels like to wear them.

Makes you feel ten feet high.

I mean, it's an amazing experience to do that.

Plus, they're made specifically for you.

You know, you go over to Holick's, you get those done.

They've been engineered to work exactly just for you, and I can guarantee you because I know- because I wore them: they are the most comfortable thing, you know, if they're custom-made for you, it's just great.

They are most comfortable to wear.

And they feel great emotionally because you worked very hard to get that privilege.

- -Absolutely.

I want to do- I want to talk about the other big issue- We said they were mostly formed in the 40s, but there was one other giant change that happened, and that was when women joined the Corps.

- -Yes.

- -They had to suddenly rethink or redesign a little bit what a corps uniform looks like for a female cadet.

It took them a while to try to really settle in on the way to go.

The very first uniforms they created were similar but very different to what the male cadets were wearing.

The first ones were worn as an over-blouse rather than being tucked in with the belt, so that didn't last very long.

Even before they got the new shirts, I think they started tucking them in so that their white belts - once they- some of them got white belts - they wanted to show those off.

So, you know, it started slowly.

They had a beret.

Not a soft beret, but it was kind of formed into the shape of a beret.

A black beret is the hat that they wore at first.

Well, that didn't last very long, either.

Before long, they were wearing garrison caps that were based on the design of World War Two nurse officer and black officer hats, just the way it should be.

And, you know, slowly it kind of evolved and they got their own version of every uniform, and ultimately now, it's pretty well perfected.

I mean, it's not exactly like a World War Two W.A.C.

uniform, but it really evokes that quite, quite well.

- -Another thing I was interested to learn was the boot question: "Okay.

They're in, but are we going to let them wear boots?"

And - -Oh, yes.

Colonel Woodall, who is also an A&M Press author and a good friend of ours, he was the commandant at that time, and he said, "If they're a senior in the Corps, they're going to wear those boots."

- -Yes, everybody... The cadets he had, you know, committees of them trying to get them to make the right decision, but it was so controversial to them.

You know, Aggies don't like change of any kind.

And so they said, "No, let's let's take it to the next year."

And Colonel Woodall said, "Oh, come on!"

And so over the summer - I believe it was 1979 - he is the one who granted their boot privileges.

And he said, "Y'all go get your boots," and they wore them, and cheers to him.

I mean, that was exactly the right thing to do.

And look at them today.

- -Absolutely.

They look great.

The other, I would say, biggest change maybe is as we started getting newer fabric types when polyester was invented, that was also probably a pretty big change to the uniforms.

- -Yes, it was because before tha the issued uniforms were cotton, khaki twill, Army 8.2oz, very heavy cotton, and the style was heavy starch, very stiff, kind of uncomfortable to wear.

And, yeah, I wore some of that in high school ROTC to kind of get ready for coming to A&M.

So I know, that it's... plus, fatigues were being starched when I was here.

And those are uncomfortable if they're starched.

So, this was a whole new thing because the uniforms were then designed to look style- wise, like the old items they were wearing before, but had been discontinued by the Army.

And so now they were having to do it on their own.

But they they used the polyester fabric so that it was dry cleaner.

It was soft, easy to wear.

And I got the benefit from that coming in when I did.

And the fall of '67, they had just done away with the last of the khaki that spring just before I arrived.

- -So you got to get out of the starch.

- -I got out of that starch.

The year before, they had one set of khakis that they could wear, and I know they did at times just for Old Army's sake, if nothing else.

- -Of course.

Well, unfortunately we're running short on time here, so in our final minute, what would you hope people take away from your book?

- -Well, I hope that they would realize that the Corps uniform is a product of what Aggies wanted it to be, Aggies themselves, with the addition of Aggie administrators.

Those are the folks who decided all the details that we still see today, and those details come from Army officer uniforms, tailor- made versions of those from the 30s, 40s and early 50s.

And those details have been preserved, by the Corps of Cadets.

And that's what should be worn with senior boots, and that this tradition is kind of unique and that it does unite us in so many ways across the generations of Aggies.

And that is a special tradition, as you said, that is rare to see, and it's a very unique tradition.

- -Well, thank you so much for for coming and being here today.

- -Thank you for having me.

It's been a delight.

- -Thank you.

And as I mentioned, there's so much more in this book.

There's a whole chapter on boots, there's a chapter on specialty outfits, the band, rustling.

I mean, it's all in here.

So if you are in the corps or you love someone who's in the Corps, I would highly recommend picking up this book and looking through it because it's a- it's a wealth of history.

And I think you've just done a wonderful job putting it together.

- -Thank you, Christine.

That is all the time we have for today.

The book again is "Pressed, Clean, and Properly Fitted" by James Griffin.

Thanks so much for joining us, and I will see you again soon.