So, why the M1937 Denim Fatigue Overshirt? If you know Cloth & Cut and the inspirations that drive the brand it’s easy, if you don’t, this garment ticks all the boxes for us, military, workwear and denim.

Next question, how is it military and workwear? Well…it all started with..

The Civilian Conservation Corps, a great idea by Franklin D Roosevelt back in 1933 to get the USA back on its feet after the great depression, was part of his ‘New Deal’. With millions of Americans unemployed either on or below the poverty line, I quote FDR "I propose to create a civilian conservation corps to be used in simple work, not interfering with normal employment, and confining itself to forestry, the prevention of soil erosion, flood control and similar projects."

So they did.

As it was a government programme they needed a uniform, this needed to be tough workwear and cheap. Why reinvent the wheel, they could re-use the army uniform! (Imagined conversation by officialdom) ‘Let’s not confuse these guys with the army. No new design work is needed, let’s use the army uniform, they don’t need camouflage so we’ll do it in blue denim! ‘ (probably a good idea if they were working in the forests and woods).

So the CCC’s fatigue uniforms had blue denim trousers and jackets, the so-called M-1937 Fatigues circa - 1919-1940 confusingly.

Generally, the cut of the overshirt/jumper and trousers were oversized allowing freedom of movement for their hard manual labour.

The overshirt, is the part of the uniform we like the most.

Well, this looked like a painter’s smock with buttons from midway upwards but was called a jumper, maybe because the designers had never seen a fine arts painter before! Whatever the reason, it was called a jumper.

Right from the start the workers complained about the fatigue jumper's awkward pullover design and asked for a chore coat with a fully buttoned front. They were denied, it was a little bit cheaper to produce as a jumper, maybe buttons were more expensive back then?

‘In the spring of 1939," write Quartermaster Corps historians Erna Risch and Thomas M. Pitkin, "it was reported that one-half to three-quarters of the denim jumpers used by members of the Civilian Conservation Corps that had been received at the Columbus and Schenectady General Depots had been ripped down from the front placket.’

Now it doesn’t take a wild leap of imagination here to see two forms of practicality here. One, just rip it down the front to create the jacket design you want anyway, or two, the ‘let’s show them’ attitude that the rip just happens when we take it on and off, so we need the modification we asked for and they’ll see its cheaper to have a long-lasting garment rather than replacing it all the time.

Anyway, we’ve taken the workers of the CCCs advice and added the full top to bottom button closure. Whilst we don’t expect you to go full CCC and roll up your sleeves and start forestry conservation work in this overshirt, you definitely could, it has all the strength of workwear and military attire, in the fabric, a 13.5oz Denim, and stitching, twin and triple needle, along with bar-tacks on all the pocket stress points.

This sits well with us here with our hashtag #looksgoodactstough

Take a look for yourself CCC Denim Fatigue Overshirt

Next up the bottom half of the uniform