Standard US Army eagle button.
No letter appears on the shield to indicate a particular branch of service. The nap (brushed surface) of the woolen cloth has worn off with use and abrasion, revealing the warp and weft threads.
Greatcoat button hole created with silk twist thread in a standard buttonhole (or blanket) stitch, over a laid thread, to produce a solid line around the slit opening. Good workmanship meant closely spaced, even stitches that kept the thick, heavy…
Depicts men sitting and lying around the interior of hut. Photographic negative from an album owned by Gunner Clive Richard Balmer, Australian Imperial Forces, dated 5 June 1917.
Soldiers who are shivering from cold are inefficient fighters. Before…
Bales of wool ready to be transported for manufacturing.
Getting wool to market from all parts of inland Australia where it was produced was never easy, especially before motorized transport
Folder of sample uniform fabrics: War Department, Office of Quartermaster General, Washington D.C. Whether in peace or war, the world’s military forces required cloth of many different weights (tropical, medium, and heavy), types (flannel for…
Boy’s Suit with Ribbon, “My Father was a Soldier,” ca. 1865
Wool and silk
Jacket length: 15" (center back); Pants length: 16" (waist to hem)
Atlanta History Center, Atlanta, Georgia
1985.252.M2487
Union infantry overcoat with shoulder cape and stand collar; made of new wool broadcloth, tightly woven in a plain weave, and heavily fulled (washed to prevent shrinkage and increase durability) with collar and brass buttons. This US Army Overcoat…
Fragment of officer's tunic collar: 16 Battalion, AIF, Bloody Angle, Gallipoli. Remains of a proper right side Australian officer's tunic collar. Attached to it are a Rising Sun badge and three other badges.
Pages from a printed publicity piece published by the American Wool Council, 1450 Broadway, NY, NY; "Text Assembled from Reports of the United States Army and Navy." P. 1 - Cover; P.2 - "The Army and Navy Agree: Wool Has No Substitute"; P.3 - Spread…
An excerpt from a document by the US' organization The Textile Alliance; this page focusing on shipping troubles of getting wool from South Africa (unrestricted by the British) to the US.
Japanese government offer of guaranteed purchase of certain number of bales of Australian wool, in return for which they wish Australia to purchase a certain number of yards of their own rayon staple fiber cloth, weighing above 3 oz. per yard,…
P.2 of Japanese government document regarding trade agreement with Australia, detailing sticking points as to export restrictions on rayon staple (i.e. wool-like) fabrics. This page continues Japan's arguments in favor of allowing greater quantities…
Edith Cox wrote the Australian PM to express her views that rayon was not a suitable substitute for wool in clothing; that their had been many deaths already because of rayon's flammability; and that Australian wool would keep British citizens safer…
Memo - Cover letter to a secret report on German substitute and synthetic fibres. The report itself (one page reproduced herein) covers more than just the staple rayon industry.
Extract from Imperial Economic Committee document: Quotation at length from the Frankfurter Zeitung of 24 March 1939. "Further Improvement in Industrially Produced Textile Materials"
Typescript of cable describing Japan's prohibition of wool for civilian use in order to divert wool to export trade; a result of the conflict with China. NB: Diversion of wool to exports probably in order to earn hard currency necessary to support…
Typescript of cable describing shipment approved of wool shoddy to mill in Shanghai, November 1941. Question now is whether the shoddy was for use by the Chinese government or the Japanese?