For Fall 2023, we are introducing a new member to that MF® peacoat family: The MF® BARNSTORMER Jacket.
This bad boy is the love child between a 1920s USGC 10-button peacoat, a 1940s USN jungle cloth N-1 Deck Jacket, and vintage civilian 1930s “Duck Hunting Coats” out of the Montgomery Ward, Sears Roebuck or LL Bean catalogs.
For the story, those civilian khaki brown hunting coats/Mackinaw coats are also referred-to as “China Marine” jackets (as worn by the 4th Marines stationed in China mid-1920s to 1941), or “Iceland” jackets (as worn by First Marine Provisional Brigade stationed in Iceland circa 1941.)
Interestingly, that hunting coat style also made it on deck of USN ships in the 1940s, since several outdoor clothing contractors supplied the Navy with winter gear on the onset of WW2. See famous LIFE Magazine photos of sailors sporting a range of foul weather jackets.
We have seen a few vintage civilian specimen pass through the MF® HQ doors, and they usually get snagged pretty quickly.
From those 1930s hunting coats, we only borrowed the leather pocket welt/stops accents, an attractive color/texture contrast between the khaki jungle cloth and black horsehide trims.
The inspiration we drew from authentic 1940s US Navy N-1 deck jackets is the vintage Mil-Specs shell fabric, a sturdy and windproof 14 Oz. Jungle Cloth (aka cotton grosgrain) in its mid-40s “USN Khaki” color. This specific “olive” shade is un-issued, i.e. darker than many contemporary khaki N-1 fabrics with a lighter sun-bleached look.
For the lining of our BARNSTORMER, we stayed “plausible” and went with an all-cotton golden brown mid-wale corduroy, a reference to the hand warmer pocket bags on vintage 30s-50s USN peacoats, before the Quartermaster decided on the cheaper pocketing fabric option of an unbleached-white cotton twill.
As sleeve lining, we chose a vintage Mil-Specs OG-107 cotton sateen material, just because there’s nothing like discovering fancy expensive fabric on the inside of a garment!
The term “barnstormer” is a reference to the early days of aviation when pilots in open cockpits had to resort to all kinds of winter gear, often long and bulky leather coats not yet specifically designed for flying. Legend has it that strafing though an open Mid-West barn was a famous acrobatic circus act for a barnstorming stunt flier in the 1920s, which may, or may not, have been safer than the death-defying wing-walking routine…
The “modified” double labeling — recurring branding for our msfc “Survival School” collection — is a reference to period US military experimental clothing, and a respectful nod to the little-known Quartermaster Research Facility (aka Natick Army Labs), a US Department of Defense organization located in Natick, Massachusetts. The “CLOTHING & TEXTILE RESEARCH UNIT” has been tasked with designing and developing anything from new uniforms/gear/fabrics/camo patterns/etc for the US military since 1952.
More details on the blog
