The Birmingham age-herald., 1921-09-03
M E N /, w o N B N
 A ND T H IN G s

HVi d lcW months BlrmlnBnam Hds felt the sag" in it's business condi- tfons, which came much earlier to many of the other cities throughout the land, but men of vision look upon it as temporary, for there are already numerous signs of a better day just ahead.
 I do not suppose anything shows the way men take hard times than in the matter of dress, for it's a cu- lricus fact that many fellow will go on spending with free hand where other things are concerned, and try to fool himself or salve his conscience by wearing his old hat, shoes and clothes.
 I may be mistaken, but l think women are bit slower in giving up tleir glad rags" and there is a reason, for in most cases it's the man who does the spending where it really amounts to anything in the way of the upkeep of the home or | dress is left In the hands of what the men term the weaker sex" Per haps this is why mems clothes first felt the buyers strike"
 But I have evidence from mer- chants that there was disposition for while tn. the part of buyers of both sexes to stay out of the mar ket, but that now the prices both of men and women's wear is back to normal, more and more men and women are casting aside the old clothes for new ones. This is as it should be, for thrift carried too far stops the natural channels of busl- ness.
 But I was not thinking so much about the wars affect on causing the white people to wear their old clothes as I was about the fact that for sew eral years back the old clothes man had a hard time, for the negroes who largely kept him up were not in the market for his secondhand wares, but were buying new things with a recklessness and abandon which marked a new era in their his- tcry.
 | can remember quite well in Eu- | faula where it was the rarest thing for any of the negroes to buy store bought clothes, but that old and young men and women were con tent to wear the cast off ones Of those they served.
 A thoughtful student might write a great story on the thesis, show 1 ing how almost in generation the negro changed from the old clothes habit to custom made ones: It has been quite jump from the time when only a few negroes purchased new outfits to the present when its the exception for any of them to wear the old clothes of the whites. | I remember when the negro cooks | always laid claim to the suits, shoes, hats and other garments of we boys for their own: and their husbands stood in line for the cast off suits of the men of the family. | I'll long retain the incident Col. Alex Garber told me a few years ago. He had been down to his old home and one of the negroes on the place who had grown up with him drove him over to the station in a new buggy behind fine horse, wear | ing himself new outfit from head to foot. Alex said, Henry, I can understand why you want good horse and buggy and good clothes, but in the name of common sense what made you buy silk shirty' Henry ,grinned, and replied. well. Marse Alex. just wanted to see how it felt"
 I think I am good friend to col ored people. I am glad to see them do we'll. I want them to have good clothes. good homes, good schools, good churches. but during the war and last year. like many improvi- dent whites, they indulged in a spending spree without thought of the morrow. If the southern man is rich as long as he has a dollar in his pocket, 1t is equally true that negro feels like a capitalist as long as his pocket holds a quarter. It is not that object to any one having some of the good things of life who is able to have them, but I fear the love of cheap finery is go- ing to be the. downfall of the negro.
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