Bond Store Leisure Jacket Ad – April 27, 1945

For all you working men out there...

Let's say it's the end of a hard day at work and at last you're back in your domicile, surrounded by your adoring family, and ready to relax. Do you keep on wearing whatever you wore to work, or do you change clothes?

Eighty years ago, you might have taken a hint from the Bond Stores ad above, which ran in the Lorain Journal back on April 27, 1945 and considered changing into a nice leisure jacket. (The pipe is optional.)

What's a leisure jacket you might ask?

Unlike a leisure suit, which many of us wore in the 1970s, a leisure jacket is a little more stylish. 

An interesting website called Vintage Dancer provides a history of 1940s Men's Coats and Jacket Styles and sheds a little light on the subject. It notes, "A coat that was similar to the loafer but slightly more dressy was the leisure coat. It was designed to be worn in place of a suit jacket with a pair of dress slacks. The body of the jacket was wool or gabardine fabric with contrasting sleeves, usually in a bold prints such as plaid, checks, or diamonds. Some leisure coats incorporated Western details, yokes, and paneling. These rare coats are very collectable today."

Here's a page from a 1944 Sear catalogue showing a few in color.

They're kind of odd looking, aren't they? In my humble opinion (as a poor dresser) they look like they were assembled out of scraps of leftover material.

Anyway, check the back of your closet to see if you have one in there, alone and forgotten (and hopefully not moth-eaten). As the Vintage Dancer website notes, these jackets are very collectable.

Now as for Bond Stores, it was a chain that was founded in Cleveland in 1914, eventually growing to become the largest retail chain of men's clothing in the United States, according to its Wiki entry. Its specialty was suits that came with two pairs of pants.

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All this talking about suits reminded me that the very last suit I bought was at the long-gone Curiosity Shoppe in Avon that specialized in vintage clothing. It was a dark blue wool suit from the late 1950s or early 60s that apparently had never been worn, as it was unfinished. I paid about twelve or fifteen bucks for it and took it to a tailor that was also located in Avon. He fitted that thing to me perfectly and I wore it for years, often to my big band gigs. It was the real McCoy and just right for that kind of music.