The Navy freaked out while it bumped off bell-backside pants
Some uniform changes are welcome within the U.S. Navy (goodbye, ABUs!), and a few are very a great deal now not. There are uniform functions troops love as it actually makes their jobs less difficult. Some fabrics might be easier to put on, and some patterns have become iconic over the years. For example, imagine if the Marine Corps suddenly modified their dress blues to an all-white uniform to suit the Navy whites – there might be rioting from Lejeune to Pendleton.
That’s almost what occurred while the Navy ditched the bell-bottoms on its dungarees. The U.S. Navy had been sporting the flared cuffs on its paintings uniforms because of 1817. The concept became that sailors who would be running at the topmost decks, who were probably swabbing it or anything sailors did up there back then, could need to roll their pants up to maintain them from getting wet or grimy. Sailors had also been able to get out in their uniforms faster inside the event that they needed to abandon delivery for a few purposes.
When inside the water, then-woolen pants even doubled as a life preserver. Now, this is an application uniform. In 1901, the cloth of the uniform changed into changed to denim, and the Navy’s dungarees had been born. They nevertheless sported bell-bottom pants. Bell-bottoms even seemed at the sailors’ get dressed uniform as a way lower back because of the early 19th century. The Navy got rid of the bell-backside on its dungarees on the flip of the Twenty-first Century, a few a hundred and eighty years later. In 1999, the Navy phased out the pants with flared 12-inch bottoms for a utility uniform that functions instantly-legged darkish blue trousers. Sailors have been no longer thrilled.
“They are trying too hard to make us appear like the Coast Guard and the Air Force,” said Petty Officer Chad Heskett, a health facility corpsman at the frigate USS Crommelin. “It’s taking too much far from the subculture. It will fee the Navy more to buy these new uniforms.” By 2001, the bell-bottoms were long gone. Heskett wasn’t alone in his disdain for the new uniforms. The loss of “tradition” turned into echoed for the duration of the Navy, as is regularly the case with new uniforms. The Navy was adamant about the alternate, but the brand new utility uniforms were phased in on the timetable. It turned out to be a great choice.