It's Mad Hatter Day

Today (October 6th) is Mad Hatter Day. [For some odd reason, this shows up with a posting date of October 5th but it should be October 6th.]

That, of course, reminds me of all kinds of hats. We don’t wear hats like people did many years ago, but there are still some real doozies around.

Mad Hatter Day isn’t exactly about hats, though. According to Ari Rapkin, it’s about silliness:

Mad Hatter Day is 10/6. The date was chosen from the illustrations by John Tenniel in Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, wherein the Mad Hatter is always seen wearing a hat bearing a slip of paper with the notation "In this style 10/6". We take this as inspiration to behave in the style of the Mad Hatter on 10/6 (which is October 6 here, although in Britain Mad Hatter Day occurs on June 10...but I digress...)

Some astute observers have noted that the paper in the Mad Hatter's Hat was really an order to make a hat in the style shown, to cost ten shillings sixpence. However, it is well known that Time Is Money, and therefore Money Is Time, and therefore 10/6 may as well be the sixth of October.
Mad Hatter Day began in Boulder, CO, in 1986, among some computer folk who had nothing better to do. It was immediately recognized as valuable because they caused less damage than if they'd been doing their jobs.

Even so, I prefer to look at hats on Mad Hatter Day. I collect hats and next Sunday afternoon will attend a Hat Party (to benefit the effort to elect women to office; it's non-partisan.)


Back to the hats. One of the most storied hats, of course, is the one written about by Dr. Seuss:










Sometimes hats remind us of holidays and seasons -- and even special events, like the Easter Parade.





People show support for their favorite teams by the hats they wear:










How many little girls have spent hours and hours playing "dress up" in mommy's hats?

There are even clubs and societies based on hats, like the Red Hat Society.

We can glean insight into people's hobbies, occupations and recreational activities by the hats they wear:

Hats have been around for a long time. Some of the old-timey ones look outlandish, but, then again, so do some of today's hats.

Hats may be whimsical or funny:

Some are classy and demure.

Some hats are for men

And some hats are for women.

Some hats are small and some, thank goodness, are large enough to cover a big area.

Sometimes it's hard to tell exactly what message a hat conveys:


One of my brothers, Rod, seems to always have a hat, but it's the same straw hat no matter what he's doing:




Here's one of my favorite hats, but that's because it's on the head of my grandson:

And here's grandson Harrison with Adam, his dad. Like father, like son.

Most of the hats I've collected are in storage temporarily and not easy to get to, but here are a few from my collection and some of the hatboxes. My favorites, though, are the ones in storage.

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Well, 'hat's all, folks!

Flickr photos by Brendaleann, anteebee, Baigneuse, beth.armsheimer, bitsandbobbins, Crazy Cake Lady, Daffodilious, DownTown Pictures, Emily Quinton, fleamarketstudio, Flock Inc, foftychel, freeparking, Glorious Hats, heatherbuckley, katcat, lauralemur, loulou, Lysette Faith, madotts, Nicole', Polo Jenkins, prabhat_photo, practicalowl, sandrino, toyfoto, lady_ishmael24, MrsVedder, Akbar Simonse, binkmesterrick, Dancing Fish, danny bird, elinar, HamWithCam, Kenny Maths, knitkid