John B. Stetson Company photographs
Creation: 1924-1925Abstract
The John B. Stetson Company was a manufacturer of hats. The company was founded in 1865 by John B. Stetson (1830-1906) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The company's Kensington plant consisted of twenty-five buildings covering nine acres at Germantown and Montgomery Avenues. During its heyday in the 1920s it employed over 5,000 people to make its hats. This is a small collection of photographs and other material relating to the company. The photographs focus on the workers in and around the factory and its amenities.
Dates
- Creation: 1924-1925
Creator
- John B. Stetson Hat Company (Organization)
Extent
13 item(s)
General Physical Description
11 photographic prints : b&w ; 8 x 10 in. 1 item : typescript (6 pp.). 1 item : booklet (30 pp.).
Historical Note
The John B. Stetson Company was a manufacturer of hats. The company was founded in 1865 by John B. Stetson (1830-1906) in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The company's Kensington plant consisted of twenty-five buildings covering nine acres at Germantown and Montgomery Avenues. During its heyday in the 1920s it employed over 5,000 people to make its hats.
Although it produced all kinds of hats, The Stetson Company was best known for the cowboy hat, which came to symbolize the American West. John B. Stetson provided lifelong benefits to his employees in order to stave off unionization. This led him to establish a school, a hospital, and a building and loan association for his employees as well as such perks as sports leagues, Christmas turkeys, and Americanization classes. While Stetson hats are still being made today, the factory in Kensington was torn down in 1971 because of changing fashions and economics.
Scope and Content
This is a small collection of photographs and other material relating to the John B. Stetson Company, manufacturers of hats in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The photographs show a large group of workers outside the factory with their Christmas-bonus turkeys, employees in the Stetson auditorium, workers in the soft hat finishing department, workers in the sizing department, women workers in the trimming department, the first aid room, a mens' cafeteria, a girls
cafeteria, a dentist's office, a lounge, and the Stetson hospital. The typescript describes personnel policies of the company, including the apprentice program, bonuses, and use of the Stetson auditorium. The booklet is titled The Human Element in the Stetson Business (1925). A loose page gives Hours for Lunch
, presumably for Stetson employees.
Location
GL Box 1.
Existence and Location of Copies
View this collection in Hagley’s
Access Restrictions
This collection is open for research.
Language of Materials
English
Finding Aid & Administrative Information
- Title:
- John B. Stetson Company photographs
- Date:
- 2015
- Description rules:
- Describing Archives: A Content Standard
- Language of description:
- English
- Script of description:
- Latin
Repository Details
Repository Details
Part of the Audiovisual Collections Repository
