As I continue reading about Sir Winston, I have explored his cigars (previously mentioned) and now have bought a hat. Churchill was always pictured in a hat – a military cap, a top hat, and a Fedora, that’s the one I got.
So what does a hat say about a man? his times? his ideas?
For Churchill it was about identifiability. Apparently much of his life was about being recognized, remembered. His hat, cane, cigar sillouette became iconic. Personally satisfying for him and politically expedient.
On another personal level, it also covered his baldness. A metaphor? Image covering failings. Perhaps.
And what does the hat say about the times? I don’t know. As a Chautauqua scholar this becomes a minor investigation point though.
There’s a lovely essay about a woman remembering her deaf, immigrant grandfather. A parting image is of his teeth in a glass. “Everything’s a clue,” she writes. That’s how Churchill’s hat is too.