The Nation Expanding

Description

Blue jeans were brought to San Francisco by Morris Levi Strauss in the middle of the nineteenth century, fabricated from an indigo-dyed cotton cloth imported from the French city of Nīķes, hence the term de Nīķes, and eventually, denim. Miners, laborers, and others who worked outdoors wore these in the nineteenth century, including sailors from the Italian port of Genoa who were called genes. From these sailors originated the other name for these trousers, jeans. In the 1950s, jeans widened their appeal as they left the realm of workaday uniforms to enter the commercial marketplace.
 

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Blue Jeans
Costume Collection
306097
SI Neg.# 94-181
Anonymous Donation, 1973
 

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