The Youngest Known Bills Khakis Customer

We met 10-year-old Alex Watford this past spring at Brittons in Columbia, SC. Until we find a challenger who even comes close, we’re not going to require a copy of Alex’s birth certificate. We’re willing to declare Alex the youngest known Bills Khakis customer!

Baby Clothes: A sociological reverie.
by - G. Bruce Boyer

A few weeks ago I found myself sitting along a concourse in one of our major airports between flights, vaguely thumbing the pages of a magazine and watching the passing throng, when I was suddenly knocked base over apex with the thought that the revolution had been completed. I mean The Baby Clothes Revolution!

Perhaps I should explain. There was a time, back in the all-but-forgotten mists of the past when adults dressed radically different from their children. They wanted to. Historians tell us that back in the dim hidden past, available to us now only on PBS, children actually dressed like their parents. The theory is that children wanted to appear grown up – adults actually fostered ideas like that in little tikes – and so they imitated what older people wore. Staggeringly hard to believe, but the rationalization was that parents were trying to prepare their offspring for an adulthood where things would be considerably different from the so-called “formative” years. Practically everyone thought that children actually looked forward to becoming adults.

At any rate, all that misguidedness is now mercifully behind us, and the natural order of things has finally and completely evolved: adults now dress indistinguishably like their children. Adults realize, as children could not possibly understand, that the only sensible way to approach adulthood is to try and escape it for as long as possible. But it’s much more difficult to avoid the weighty and somber responsibility of adult life if you actually resemble one. People normally assume that if you are dressed like an adult, you are an adult, with all its attendant responsibilities.

But truth will out. Avoidance of adulthood must be the modus operandi for the enlightened: emotion-based therapies to discover the child within, glamour cosmetic surgery to gloss over the ravages of unfair experience and leaden time, the sacred ritual of the gym, and lots of toys and fun food. Not to mention the time-honored, abiding hope in the extraterrestrial and the occult (that the weight may be lifted from us deus ex machina), the low-cholesterol diets, Tonka-styled vehicles, and cryogenic salvation. These are the semiotics of our times.

But, above all it’s our outer husk, the wardrobe, that signifies our youth, and explains who and what we really are. The revered, Ancient Wardrobe of old revolved around tailored clothing and its supporting accessories. There were matching coats and trouser combinations called “suits”, worn with collared shirts and strips of cloth wound round the neck to symbolize authority. Naive perhaps and surely primitive, but mystically effective in its time.

The New Wardrobe differs completely in theory and particulars. Gravitas and dignity have been compassionately replaced with comfort. To catalogue the NW, we may conveniently begin at the bottom. Footwear is soft, and thickly padded with reinforced ankles. Uncramped, rounded toes with bumper guards protect tender toes, and large D-rings and thick laces, make tying as easy as possible for awkward, pudgy fingers.

These shoes are hyper-designed, with layers of leather, rubber, or canvas strips and straps and odd pieces of multicolored webbing. But it’s not that the manufacturer ran out of the original material and had to make do with whatever was at hand on the cutting room floor. This technique is known as “design”, and it adds immeasurably to the price of the shoes themselves. They’re worn with fuzzy little ankle socks in white or pastel shades of thick, soft, cottony terry cloth to protect sensitive little shins.

Both genders wear loose shorts or baggy play pants with elasticized waistbands (no needless belts or suspenders to bother with), and pockets secured with Velcro tabs (so the sweets don’t fall out). Pastel and vibrant crayon hues are in vogue at the moment, with black stretch tights usually reserved for the overweight. Shirts are often sleeveless and collarless, and most have logos or messages (a cuddly animal perhaps, or personal motto, or even just someone else’s name).
by Bruce Boyer

BILLS PROFILE: Stacey Owen

Name
Stacey L. Owen

Hometown
Abilene, TX

Residence
Houston, TX

Occupation
Texas Oil Man

What you do what you do?
The oil industry comprises history, science, risk, reward & failure. It’s a business roller coaster with a chance to win the Lotto. I will be doing it ’til I’m taking a dirt nap.

Biggest Risk You Ever Took
Quitting my job to borrow a huge amount of money and start drilling.

15 Minutes of fame?
The first well I drilled, hit. But depleted on test.

Proudest Moment?
When she said, “I do.”

Favorite Distractions?
Wing shooting, tarpon on fly rods, reading.

Favorite Book?
Anything by Bartle Bull, Carl Hiaasen or Wilbur Smith.

Moment You'll Never Live Down?
Streaking Theta Kite Flight, 1973 (University of Texas sorority street party).

Philosophy of Life?
When you quit having fun, do something else… and don’t sweat the small stuff.

How You First Discovered Bills Khakis?
I had been harping to Bob Rose (R. Rose Clothiers, Houston, TX) about not being able to find khakis as good as the old army surplus ones,… Bills Khakis were in his store 2 weeks later. I own over 40 pairs with more on order.”

War Hero Comes To Life...Comes To Reading

The exact year is not completely clear, but it was sometime in 1948 or 1949 that the crew of this AT-17 Bombardier Navigator Trainer lined up for this snapshot at Mitchell Field in Long Island, NY. At age 86, Truman Hermansen (front center) can recall the names of all but one of his fellow airmen with whom he trained between WWII and the Korean War, some 54 years ago. This photo came to Bills Khakis from the desk of Woody Appleby, son of the late Len Appleby (standing second from left). Woody is our Bills Khakis sales representative in the South Eastern United States and presented this picture to us for reproduction as a tribute to his father. The picture has been converted to a point of sale poster celebrating the heritage of our product and is displayed at hundreds of Bills Khakis retailers across the country; yet the details of the shot have remained very much a mystery, until recently.

Gail Pantezzi, Truman Hermansen’s daughter, was strolling the streets of Portsmouth,
NH this past summer when she was astonished to identify her father in our poster displayed
at Cavanagh’s on Bow Street. Gale phoned her father on the spot to share the news
that he was featured in the window display of a store over 1500 miles away from his home
in Florida.

In early July, the name Truman Hermanson had gotten back to us via a phone call, not from Truman, nor from Gale, but from Reading, PA native and Bills Khakis wearer Rob Wolf, who was recently married to Truman’s granddaughter Noelle. Naturally, everyone at Bills Khakis, including Woody Appleby, was thrilled to hear the news and learn of the possibility of meeting one of the many heroes from a generation to which we owe so much.

August 6th, 2003 was one of the most exciting days ever at Bills Khakis. The faces of Len Appleby, Truman Hermansen, Bob Head, and the entire crew have long been images beyond our reach, but never beyond our admiration and respect. To meet and spend time with one of them was nothing short of magical.

Truman Hermansen served his country for a total of 26 years in both active and reserve duty. He served in WWII from 1942 to 1945, flying missions out of England deep into Europe and later in the Korean War from 1952 through 1954, flying missions between Korea and Japan. Truman retired from service in 1968, and now lives in Jacksonville, FL with his wife Eleanor, who coincidently bought a Buick Roadmaster from Len Appleby in 1954 as the Korean war ended. It is our honor to salute Truman Hermansen’s service to our country in the Free Press.

The starch legends are made of...
Discipline, training, knowledge, and "starched khakis" were all part of American soldier life in his preparation for supernumerary, soldier of the quarter, or sergeant of the guard. First, you "broke starch" with a yardstick or gun barrel, then you were lowered from your bunk or a table into your khakis by as many as five troopers - your buddy laced your boots and bloused your trousers to prevent creases. After all the preparation, you were lifted at your forearms and transported by bus or truck, in standing position, with your "glaring shined brass", "spit shined boots", and yes, those "infamous un-creased khaki trousers". It was enough starch to win the approval of the commanding officer, and nearly enough to stop a tank.
Ret. Colonel Ric Favati, U.S. Army

This is all that most people know about Reading.

We know it’s been on your mind forever, so here are eleven
little known facts about our home, Reading, Pennsylvania.

• Author John Updike is from Reading, well actually, he’s from a Reading suburb called Shillington.
• Reading is home to the Penske Racing Team, winner of 13 Indy 500’s, including the last 3 years!
• The Reading Railroad Company was the largest industrial corporation in the world just prior to the Civil War.
• The 5th Avenue candy bar is named after 5th Avenue in West Reading.
• Reading is home to Pennsylvania’s only Pagoda. (We’re still fact checking this)
• Reading was supposed to be the next Pittsburgh, but we didn’t have the natural resources (like oil) and we only had one river, and the railroad was doomed for extinction anyway. Truth is, we really wanted to keep Reading a small quiet little town.
• Reading was an automobile manufacturing hub for the first quarter of the 20th century, led by Charles Duryea, the inventor of the world’s first hill-climbing gasoline automobile.
• Reading is officially “Baseballtown USA,” home of the Double AA Reading Phillies.
• Reading is 55 miles from Philadelphia, 42 miles closer to Philadelphia than New York.
• Reading based Arrow International is the maker of the world’s only completely implantable left ventricular assist heart pump.
• Reading is the home of actor Michael Constantine, the principal in TV’s “Room 222” and the father in “My Big Fat Greek Wedding.”

“HAAWGISMS”


Eddie Holden (a.k.a. the Haawg), the Bills Khakis sales rep in the deep south, is famous for his stories and profound views on life…“My wife says if I ever want to start actin’ like a kid again, first I’ll have to grow up.”

 

 

 

A NOTE FROM BILL
Our newsletter is intended to extend a special look into our company, the people behind it, and most importantly, the personalities that really make things tick, our customers. We are looking for your letters and photographs for inclusion in our next newsletter. Tell us about your life adventures with Bills Khakis. Your contributions are not only appreciated, but necessary to create a newsletter that lives up to the above.

Contact Marge at 1-800-43-khaki or customerservice@billskhakis.com with submissions, contributions and pictures.