Stylin' LITTLE LORD FAUNTLEROY

I have no idea what year this was taken, but it comes from the same Ukiah album that had the photo of the kindergarten children from a few days ago.

I have to feel sorry for this lad, no matter where he lived. It is possible he lived in Canada where many of the album photos are from. If it was taken in the rough and tumble agricultural community of Ukiah...let's hope by the time he was in school his mother had stopped dressing him like Little Lord Fauntleroy. I will admit he seems to be workin' the runway.


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Little Lord Fauntleroy is the first children's novel written by English playwright and author Frances Hodgson Burnett. It was originally published as a serial in the St. Nicholas Magazine between November 1885 and October 1886, then as a book by Scribner's in 1886. The accompanying illustrations by Reginald Birch set fashion trends and Little Lord Fauntleroy also set a precedent in copyright law when in 1888 its author won a lawsuit against E. V. Seebohm over the rights to theatrical adaptations of the work.

The Fauntleroy suit, so well-described by Burnett and realized in Reginald Birch's detailed pen-and-ink drawings, created a fad for formal dress for American middle-class children:

"What the Earl saw was a graceful, childish figure in a black velvet suit, with a lace collar, and with lovelocks waving about the handsome, manly little face, whose eyes met his with a look of innocent good-fellowship." (Little Lord Fauntleroy)

The Fauntleroy suit appeared in Europe as well, but nowhere was it as popular as in America. The classic Fauntleroy suit was a velvet cut-away jacket and matching knee pants worn with a fancy blouse with a large lace or ruffled collar. These suits appear right after the publication of Mrs. Burnett's story (1885) and were a major fashion until after the turn of the 20th century. Many boys who did not wear an actual Fauntleroy suit wore suits with Fauntleroy elements such as a fancy blouse or floppy bow. Only a minority of boys wore ringlet curls with these suits, but the photographic record confirms that many boys did. It was most popular for boys about 3–8 years of age, but some older boys wore them as well. It has been speculated that the popularity of the style encouraged many mothers to breech their boys earlier than before and was a factor in the decline of the fashion of dressing small boys in dresses and other skirted garments. Clothing Burnett popularized was modeled on the costumes she tailored herself for her two sons, Vivian and Lionel. (SOURCE: Wikipedia)