Bibliographic Sources
This annotated list of books, catalogues, journal articles, and pamphlets is arranged by date of publication. They are the primary sources of general information about American academic dress used by the Intercollegiate Registry of Academic Costume for this website.
THE 1895 INTERCOLLEGIATE CODE OF ACADEMIC COSTUME:
The Inter-Collegiate Academic Costume (Albany, NY: Cotrell & Leonard, n.d. but c.1902). This is an advertising pamphlet from the Cotrell & Leonard firm that includes the text of a “draft suggestion for a By-Law, Regulation or Statute to be enacted by Institutions wishing to carry into effect” what the pamphlet calls the “Inter-collegiate Cap, Gown and Hood system” approved on 16 May 1895. A copy of this pamphlet can be seen here.
THE 1935 ACADEMIC COSTUME CODE:
Ferry, Frederick C. “An Academic Costume Code”. The Educational Record (July 1935); reprint Washington, DC: American Council on Education, 1935. A copy of this brochure can be seen here.
Marsh, Clarence, Stephen, ed. “An Academic Costume Code”. In American Universities and Colleges, 3rd ed. Washington, D.C.: American Council on Education, 1936, 1065-1067.
Marsh, Clarence, Stephen, ed. “An Academic Costume Code”. In American Universities and Colleges, 4th ed. Washington, D.C.: American Council on Education, 1940, 1056-1058. This edition of the 1935 Academic Costume Code contains a slight change to the Faculty color list: “Humanics” has been changed to “Humanities”.
THE 1960 ACADEMIC COSTUME CODE:
Irwin, Mary, ed. “An Academic Costume Code and an Academic Ceremony Guide”. In American Universities and Colleges, 8th ed. Washington, D.C.: American Council on Education, 1960, 1134-1137. This was a poorly-planned update of the 1935 Academic Costume Code.
The current version of the American Council on Education’s 1960 Academic Costume Code, last modified in 1987, can be seen here.
LISTS OF ACADEMIC HOOD LINING PATTERNS:
“Uniform Scheme of Academic Gowns and Hood”. The Living Church Quarterly 11:1 (1 December 1895), 59-64. This article was sent to the editor of this quarterly by the members of the Intercollegiate Commission on Academic Costume and contains a copy of the 1895 Intercollegiate Code of Academic Costume and a list of college colors appended to the Code by the authors of the Code. At this early date the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume was still working out a method of dividing two or more colors in the hood lining of a given college or university in a way that would distinguish between schools that used the same colors.
“Albany Bureau of Academic Costume: Caps, Gowns and Regalia for American Colleges Originate Here”. The [Albany, NY] Argus, 27 July 1902. This newspaper article contains an early partial list of college and university hood lining patterns that can be seen here.
Leonard, Gardner C. “Academic Costume”. In A Cyclopedia of Education, Volume 1, edited by Paul Monroe. New York: Macmillan, 1911, 14-18. A copy of the hood lining list in this article can be seen here, and a painting to illustrate some of those hoods prepared for this article can be seen here. The list of hood lining patterns is almost identical to the list from the 1902 Argus (see above), but there are a few differences.
Leonard, Garner Cotrell. “Costume, Academic”. In The Encyclopedia Americana, Volume 8, New York: The Encyclopedia Americana Corporation, 1918, 48-52. A copy of the hood lining list in this article can be seen here. This is not a complete list of hood lining patterns the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume had approved, but at 97 colleges and universities it was the longest published Intercollegiate Bureau list thus far. A complete list of the Bureau’s hood lining patterns would not appear until 1927 (see below).
Haycraft, Frank W. The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities & Colleges. Ware: Jennings & Bewley, 1923. The information about American academic costume in this book is from c.1912-1914, and appears to be a short list of hood lining patterns from the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume that was supplemented with college color information from the 1909 or 1910 edition of the World Almanac.
Haycraft, Frank W. The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities and Colleges, New and Revised Edition. London: Cheshunt Press, 1924. The information about American academic costume in this book is from c.1923. Like the first edition (1923) of this book the hood lining information appears to have been compiled from a short list from the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume, padded with college color information from the 1923 edition of the World Almanac. Neither the 1923 nor the 1924 editions of this book are particularly trustworthy because most of the hood lining information was generated by assuming the first color listed for a college or university in the World Almanac is the hood lining color and the second color listed in the World Almanac is the chevron color.
Haycraft, Frank W. The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities and Colleges, 3rd ed. London: Cheshunt Press, 1927. The information about American academic costume in this book is from c.1925 and was sourced from the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume. This is an extremely important list as it is the first known complete list of hood lining patterns from the Intercollegiate Bureau. It can be seen here.
Haycraft, Frank W. Revised and enlarged by E. W. Scobie Stringer. The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities and Colleges, 4th ed. Cheshunt: Cheshunt Press, 1948. The information about American academic costume in this book is from c.1946 and is another complete list of hood lining patterns from the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume. Like the 1927 edition, however, this list includes numerous “generic” hood lining patterns the Bureau recorded for colleges and universities that had not contacted the Bureau for an official hood lining pattern assignment, or recorded for colleges and universities that had contacted the Bureau but did not offer terminal degrees. These “generic” patterns were simply a record of the school’s colors with the first color cited as the hood lining and the second color cited as the color of a chevron. This list can be seen here.
Sheard, Kevin. Academic Heraldry in America. Marquette, MI: Northern Michigan College Press, 1962. A seminal work of academic costume research. Sheard contacted every college and university in the United States, asking them to describe the hood lining pattern they were using at the time (c.1960). He compiled the information about those colleges and universities that responded, which gives contemporary researchers insight into the hood linings American schools were using in 1960 – which was not necessarily what the Intercollegiate Bureau had assigned to them.
Lockmiller, David A. Scholars on Parade: Colleges, Universities, Costumes and Degrees. NY: Macmillan, 1969. The list of hood lining patterns Lockmiller received from the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume can be seen here. The Bureau seems to have used information from Sheard’s Academic Heraldry in America (1962, see above) to update the out-of-date hood lining information it had for colleges and universities that were no longer clients of Cotrell & Leonard, where the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume was located.
Smith, Hugh. Assisted by Kevin Sheard. Academic Dress and Insignia of the World: Gowns, Hats, Chains of Office, Hoods, Rings, Medals and other Degree Insignia of Universities & Other Institutions of Learning, Volumes Two and Three. Capetown, South Africa: A. A. Balkema, 1970. The second and third volumes of this massive tome include updated information about American academic costume, including hood lining patterns and Faculty colors, compiled by Kevin Sheard. One may think of these volumes as a “second edition” of Sheard’s Academic Heraldry in America (1962).
Haycraft, Frank W. Revised and enlarged by Frederick R. S. Rogers, Charles A. H. Franklyn, George W. Shaw, and Hugh Alexander Boyd. The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities and Colleges, 5th ed. Lewes, Sussex: W. E. Baxter, Ltd., 1972. The list of American hood lining patterns in this book dates from c.1971 and, along with other information about American academic costume, is sourced from the Intercollegiate Bureau. The Bureau, in turn, was taking much of its hood lining information from Sheard’s 1962 and 1970 lists (see above). One of the authors of The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities and Colleges rearranged the Bureau’s hood lining list by state, which can be seen here. By this point the Cotrell & Leonard firm, home of the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume, was having serious financial problems that would bankrupt the company in 1980.
(BOOKS, ENCYCLOPEDIAS, NEWSPAPERS, AND JOURNALS:
Wood, T.W. The Degrees, Gowns, and Hoods of the British, Colonial, Indian, and American Universities and Colleges. London: Thomas Pratt & Sons, n.d. but c.1883.
“Editor’s Study”. Harper’s New Monthly Magazine 94:561 (February 1897), 481-483.
“School Equipment: Graduation Gowns”. The School Journal 62:22 (1 June 1901), 603-604.
“Albany Bureau of Academic Costume: Caps, Gowns and Regalia for American Colleges Originate Here”. The [Albany, NY] Argus, 27 July 1902. A copy of this article can be seen here.
“Degree”. In The New International Encyclopaedia, Volume 5, edited by Daniel Coit Gilman, Harry Thurston Peck, and Frank Moore Colby. New York: Dodd, Mead and Co., 1903, 756-758. A copy of a lithograph illustration for this article can be seen here.
“The Inter-Collegiate Cap and Gown System” The Miami Student 23:5 (February 1904), 156-157.
Chittenden, Alice Hill. “The Academic Cap, Gown and Hood: Their Origin and Significance”. The Chautauquan 43:6 (March-April 1906), 562-567.
“Degree”. In The New International Encyclopaedia, Volume 6, edited by Daniel Coit Gilman, Harry Thurston Peck, and Frank Moore Colby. New York: Dodd, Mead and Co., 1906, 74-76.
Barker, Edwin L. “Academic Millinery”. The American Educational Review 30:12 (September 1909), 602-604.
“American Cap, Gown, and Hood”. Sigma Kappa Triangle 3:4 (July 1909), 261-265.
Alden, Raymond MacDonald. “Academic Ceremonial”. The Independent 67:3180 (11 November 1909), 1073-1077.
Leonard, Gardner C. “Academic Costume”. In A Cyclopedia of Education, Volume 1, edited by Paul Monroe. New York: Macmillan, 1911, 14-18.
“Universities”. In The Encyclopaedia Britannica, Volume 27, New York: The Encyclopaedia Britannica Co., 1911, 777-780.
“Academic Costume”. The American Educational Review 34:8 (May 1913), 414-415.
“Albany Bureau of Academic Costume: Caps, Gowns and Regalia for American Colleges Originate Here”. The [Albany, NY] Argus, 27 July 1902. Reprint, Albany: Cotrell & Leonard, n.d. but text c.1909-1913 and Faculty color list c.1915-1918. This pamphlet is undated, but refers to US President Taft, who held office from 1909 until 1913, but not to “President” Wilson, who instead is described as a “writer”. (The original 1902 Argus newspaper article cited above lists US Presidents up to and including Theodore Roosevelt, who was in office from 1901 until 1909.) The list of college and university hood patterns in the pamphlet is identical to that found in the article on “Academic Costume” in A Cyclopedia of Education from 1911 (but written in 1910). So the text of the pamphlet must be c.1909-1913. However, the list of Faculty colors in the copy of this pamphlet in my possession – a list that is in a different typeface than the rest of the pamphlet – indicates a later revision of this part of the pamphlet by c.1918 at the latest, and the gown and hood price list suggests a publication date closer to 1915-1918 rather than 1909.
“Marks Distinguishing Degrees”. The Anchora of the Delta Gamma Fraternity (1 November 1914), 93.
“Academic Dress”. The World Almanac and Encyclopedia 1914. New York: Press Publishing Co., 1913, 610.
“Academic Dress”. The World Almanac and Encyclopedia 1915. New York: Press Publishing Co., 1914, 639.
“Academic Dress”. The World Almanac and Encyclopedia 1916. New York: Press Publishing Co., 1915, 598.
“Academic Dress”. The World Almanac and Encyclopedia 1917. New York: Press Publishing Co., 1916, 714.
“Academic Dress”. The World Almanac and Encyclopedia 1918. New York: Press Publishing Co., 1917, 630.
“The Intercollegiate Code: Its Inception and Significance”. The Trident of Delta Delta Delta 26:3 (April 1917), 355-356.
Ward, Harry Parker. The American College Catalog. Columbus: The Champlin Press, 1917.
Jewett, Almira. “Color Symbolism”. The Quarterly Journal of the University of North Dakota 9:1 (October 1918), 50-71.
Leonard, Garner Cotrell. “Costume, Academic”. In The Encyclopedia Americana, Volume 8, New York: The Encyclopedia Americana Corporation, 1918, 48-52.
Haycraft, Frank W. The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities & Colleges. Ware: Jennings & Bewley, 1923.
Haycraft, Frank W. The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities and Colleges, New and Revised Edition. London: Cheshunt Press, 1924.
Haycraft, Frank W. The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities and Colleges, 3rd ed. London: Cheshunt Press, 1927.
Baty, T. Academic Colours. Tokyo: Kenkyusha Press, 1934.
Lawrence, Ruth. Presenting an Exhibition of Academic Costume at the University of Minnesota. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota, May 1938.
Haycraft, Frank W. Revised and enlarged by E.W. Scobie Stringer. The Degrees and Hoods of the World’s Universities and Colleges, 4th ed. Cheshunt: Cheshunt Press, 1948.
“Speaking of Pictures… Hoods Tell Degree, College and Field of Study”. Life (16 October 1950), 20-21.
Hugh Weideman, The Rapid Fact Finder (New York, NY: Thomas Y. Crowell Co., 1958).
“To Increase Your Enjoyment of Commencement Pageantry”. Southern California Alumni Review 40:8 (May 1959), 10-11.
Sheard, Kevin. Academic Heraldry in America. Marquette, MI: Northern Michigan College Press, 1962.
Armagost, Robert. “University Uniforms: The Standardization of Academic Dress in the United States”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 9 (2009), 138-155. This article can be read here.
Boven, David. “American Universities’ Departure from the Academic Costume Code”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 9 (2009), 156-174. This article can be read here.
Wolgast, Stephen. “The Intercollegiate Code of Academic Costume: An Introduction”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 9 (2009), 9-37. This article can be read here.
Wolgast, Stephen. “The Demise of ‘Faculty’ Meanings in US Hoods and a Manifesto for Change”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 11 (2011), 76-90. This article can be read here.
Wolgast, Stephen. “’A Pleasure and an Honor’: Students’ Writing on Academic Dress at Columbia University,1820-1950”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 14 (2014), 94-106. This article can be read here.
Suit, Kenneth L. Jr. “The Iridescent Web: American Degree Colours (1895–1935)”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 15 (2015), 41-74. This article can be read here.
Wolgast, Stephen. “Stitched Into History: A Brief Review of Some Tailors’ Labels in Academic Dress”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 16 (2016), 56-66. This article can be read here.
Suit, Kenneth L. Jr. “Conforming to the Established Standards: American Degree Colours (1936–1961)”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 17 (2017), 39-75. This article can be read here.
Everett, Michael. “The Use of Academic Regalia at a Land-Grant University: Faculty Attitudes and Beliefs”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 18 (2018), 32-52. This article can be read here.
Peay, Steven A. “’Appropriate Hoods’: The Development of Academic Dress at Nashotah House Theological Seminary”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 18 (2018), 53-74. This article can be read here.
Wolgast, Stephen, and Michael Everett. “’Outdated and Anachronistic, but That’s Part of the Fun’: Faculty Attitudes and Beliefs Regarding Academic Dress at a Second Land-Grant University”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 19 (2019), 173-182. This article can be read here.
Suit, Kenneth L. Jr. “Reaping the Whirlwind: American Degree and Subject Colours (1962–present)”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 20 (2020), 107-142. This article can be read here.
Grubb, Valentina S. “The Curious Case of a Women’s Academic Collar”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 21 (2021), 9-16. This article can be read here.
Heavens, Nicholas. “Peculiar and Proper Habits: The Use and Production of Academic Dress in Colonial, Revolutionary, and Federal Philadelphia”. Transactions of the Burgon Society 21 (2021), 38-80. This article can be read here.
ACADEMIC COSTUME CATALOGUES:
Leonard, Gardner Cotrell. The Cap and Gown in America. Albany: Cotrell & Leonard, 1894.
Leonard, Gardner Cotrell. The Cap and Gown in America, to which is added An Illustrated Sketch of the Intercollegiate System of Academic Costume. Albany: Cotrell & Leonard, 1896.
Intercollegiate Bureau and Registry of Academic Costume Bulletin 13. Albany: Cotrell & Leonard, 1898.
Concerning Caps, Gowns and Hoods Bulletin 17. Albany: Cotrell & Leonard, n.d. but c.1902.
Concerning Caps, Gowns and Hoods Bulletin 20. Albany: Cotrell & Leonard, n.d. but c.1905.
Concerning Caps, Gowns and Hoods Bulletin 21. Albany: Cotrell & Leonard, n.d. but c.1906.
Concerning Caps, Gowns and Hoods Bulletin 24. Albany: Cotrell & Leonard, n.d. but c.1909.
“Academic Caps and Gowns”. Costume Through the Ages. Philadelphia: Waas & Son, 1928.
Erwin, John. The History of Academic Costume in America. Albany, NY: Cotrell & Leonard for the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume, n.d. but c.1928.
E.R. Moore Company. Chicago, IL: E. R. Moore Company, 1932.
Do Your Academic Robes Signify More than Degrees? Champaign, IL: Collegiate Cap and Gown Company, n.d. but c.1935.
The History of Academic Costume in America. Albany, NY: Cotrell & Leonard for the Intercollegiate Bureau of Academic Costume, 1936.
Academic Clothing for Bachelor, Master, Doctor. New London, OH: C. E. Ward Company, n.d. but c.1938-1943.
Walters, Helen. The Story of Caps and Gowns. Chicago, IL: E. R. Moore Company, 1939.
Cohen, Emanuel I. History of Academic Caps, Gowns and Hoods. Philadelphia, PA: National Academic Cap & Gown Co., 1940.
Hoppner, O.J. Academic Costume in America: A Compendium. Albany, NY: Cotrell & Leonard, 1948.
Walters, Helen. The Story of Caps and Gowns, 3rd printing. Chicago, IL: E. R. Moore Company, 1949.
Academic Costumes. New London, OH: C. E. Ward Company, 1952.
Authentic Academic Costumes of Lasting Enjoyment. New York, NY: Bentley & Simon, 1958.
Belting, Natalia M. The History of Caps and Gowns. New York, NY: Collegiate Cap & Gown Company, 1958.
Hoppner, O.J. Academic Costume in America: A Compendium. Albany, NY: Cotrell & Leonard, n.d. but c.1965.
Baxter, Frank C., and Helen Waters. Caps, Gowns and Commencements. Chicago, IL: E. R. Moore Company, 1966.