Democratic Sentinel, Volume 14, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 November 1890 — Eadge-Wearing the Latest Fad. [ARTICLE]

Eadge-Wearing the Latest Fad.

“1 just met a very distinguished man on Broadway,” said an English tourist lately landed to me the other day. “He was a member of some order or other. I’m not sure whether it was French or Italian. I think he belongs to more than one.” Ten minutes later I met this distinguished man, and his orders were neither French nor German. He was a member of the Barbers’ Protective Association, an East (Side athletic club, and a dancing coterie. This mistake on tbe part of the British tourist calls to mind the fact that one man out of ten that are met on any of the upper thoroughfares wears badges of some sort or other. Most of the badges are small, and some are rich and costly in design, and as a rule they are worn on the left lapel of the coat where a boutonniere usually appears. When the reader remembers that there are in this country over 5,000 secret societies, some large and prosperous, but most of which are confined to tlie town which gave them birth, and that most of the members wear some distinctive badge, this wondeiful growth in the badge-wear-ing fad is not really so wonderful after all. \esterday I met on Sixth avenue a tall man with a military air, who would have been taken * for a field marshal at least in any foreign city. I aualyzed the badges that covered his waistcoat like the rounds of the “J acob’s ladder” that national guardsmen wear. The list was as follows: Masonic—Blue Lodge, Chapter, Council, Commandery, Lodge of Perfection, Temple of Mecca. Knights of Pythias. Order of Foresters. Ancient Order of American Workmen. Legion of Honor. Grand Army of the Bepublic. Ninth Begimont, National Guards. That was all, but as each order had its badge, and as each badge was worn, the waistcoat looked like the breast of the Prince of \V ales in his dress parade costume. Of course few badge wearers go to this extreme, but enough of them have their special vanities to make the fad a marked one in New York City.— New York Herald.