The Fort Dodge Messenger: June 9, 1903

Bird Feathers Will be Tabooed

Edict Against Practice Handed Down By the Millinery Jobber Association.

Fort Dodge women will no longer adorn their queenly heads with the feathers and wings of the birdling, for the milliners will no longer carry in stock the bird as an article of wearing apparel. The edict has gone forth from the Millinery Jobbers’ association which convened in Milwaukee on May 21 and the Audubon society was so notified. Fort Dodge milliners have received notification of the new move and will have to stand by the agreement that no song birds will be sold from their establishments for the decoration of the headgear of the fair feminine creature with the spirit of humaneness in her heart.

It is estimated that there has been at least 100,000 song birds distributed about the markets of the south and west every year for that adornment and the evolution will cause a complete change in the adornment of the hat. The resolution adopted at the jobbers’ association at Milwaukee is as follows:

“Resolved, That the Milliner Jobbers’ association, assembled in convention at Milwaukee, does hereby concur in the agreement entered into between the Milliners Merchants’ Protective association of New York, the Audubon society, and the American Ornithologists’ union, regarding the buying and selling of birds and bird plumage, known as fancy feathers.”

By the agreement entered into some birds will be permitted on women’s hat. Among these are the white, natural and colored pigeons, white and colored doves, parrots, parquets, merles, impayens, nocobars, Japan and China pheasants, golden pheasants, marrabruts, gouras, the argus, peacock, swans and domestic fowls.

Tags: 1903, millinery