PAY DAY Coverall 1950s

PAY DAY was born in the early 1920s as JCPenney's private brand for workwear. In the 1950s, JCPenney was a retail giant with over 1,600 stores across the United States. It focused on in-store sales rather than catalog sales, delivering uniform quality clothing to all workplaces, from farms to steel mills. The company did not have its own factories, instead outsourcing OEM production to major manufacturers of the time.

This time, I'm digging up a PAY DAY coverall, which is thought to be from the 1950s.

The first thing I noticed when I took it apart was that there was more "reason" behind it than just "care." You can see the context behind every detail. It's as if you can hear the decisions made by the person who made the clothes at the time.

Misaligned buttons and the essence of 2-way design

The position of the first button is clearly shifted towards the side.

At first I thought it was a design flaw, but when I looked more closely I realized that wasn't the case.

Only the top buttonhole is made inside out . This leads to a hypothesis. The basic shape of this garment was designed as an "open collar." Usually, the first button is undone and the garment is worn open at the chest. This is the standard way to wear it.

However, in bad weather, it can be closed up to the neck. 2-way design.

And here's the crux of the matter: when you fasten the first button, it's pulled to the side, causing the front of the garment to move diagonally upwards. If the button is left in the normal position, there won't be enough distance, and the fabric will become distorted.

What you should pay attention to here is the diagonal buttonhole below the second button.

A common interpretation is that it was made for a pocket watch chain, and I don't deny that.
But this time I'd like to propose a different theory.

I think this hole is an adjustment hole to avoid distortion due to insufficient distance when wearing a two-way jacket. The reason it's cut at an angle is to accommodate the button at a vertical angle, which is what happens when the first button is fastened. It all makes sense.

I wonder which one it is.

What the cut tells us

When I took it apart, I found that there were several areas where the inside was left raw, such as the edge of the patch on the inside of the pocket, and the area where it was folded in half and stitched down.

The use of bleed edges is not uncommon in vintage clothing, but the question to ask is whether the bleed edge is with a lock or without a lock at all.

This particular example is the latter. There are no overlocked edges throughout.

If the edges were cut with a lock, it could be interpreted as cost-cutting or a compromise on specifications. However, if the edges were cut with no lock at all, it means that the process of edge processing itself was not part of the design concept of this garment. If the edges are wrapped with a rolled stitch, they are hidden inside. No costs are spent on parts that cannot be seen. This is thorough rationality.

The red bartack is a sales pitch

The latch is red.

In general, changing the color of thread on workwear is extremely inefficient, as it requires the time and effort of changing the thread on the sewing machine. Despite this, this item has chosen to use a red bartack.

This is not a question of efficiency or strength, but a sales element .

The icon was created to make PAY DAY instantly recognizable among the piles of denim in stores. This highlights the fierce competitive backdrop of the time, when it was necessary to make denim stand out even at the expense of costs.

The orange stitching of Levi's and the red clasp of PAY DAY are direct messages to customers who are forced to make a choice in front of the display stand.

The reason why double stitching "skips" and two hypotheses about the pen holder

The double stitched corners cause the stitches to skip.

This is evidence that it was sewn using a twin-needle sewing machine from that time. "Two stitches with one needle" or "one stitch (simultaneous) with two needles"? Looking at the strength alone, there is not much difference. However, when imagining the manufacturing process of this particular item, this is an easy-to-understand dividing point.

In a twin-needle sewing machine, the distance between the two needles is fixed. Therefore, when turning a corner, even if the outer needle has completely turned, the inner needle still tries to go straight, creating a "physical time lag." If you suddenly change direction at this point, the inner stitch will jump out diagonally, ignoring the corner. This is the true nature of "double stitch corner jumps."

Furthermore, the opening of the pen holder is folded at an unnatural angle .

There are two hypotheses about this.

The first is consideration for the user : by folding it diagonally, the opening widens, functioning as a "guide" to make it easier to slide the pen in.

Another reason is consideration for the maker (factory) . When stitching on a flat surface, you need a "mark" to know where to stop and where to start. So, the fabric was folded diagonally, and the resulting "corner" served as a visual marker. I believe it functioned as a marker when running the sewing machine.

Whether it's a bevel to guide a pen or a sign to guide the needle of a sewing machine, either way, even in the midst of the wave of efficiency, there is still human intention. It's things like this that really appeal to me.

The invisible ear and the logic of the wrap stitch

The center back is finished with a rolled stitch, as are most of the seams.

When I took it apart, I found that there was a "selvedge of fabric" hidden inside the wrap stitching.

The design idea of ​​"exposing the selvedge" existed even back then. The Levi's 501 from the same era shows this. So why did PAY DAY choose to use a wrap stitch to hide the selvedge? Four reasons come to mind.

1. Standardization of materials : Since the introduction of the revolutionary Salzer loom in 1953, the factory had been mixing the old single width (with selvedge) and the new double width (without selvedge). I think they wanted to standardize the structure so that they could sew either type of fabric to the same specifications.

2. Eliminating the ironing process : Using the selvedge to "split" the seam requires an ironing process. On the other hand, with a rolled seam, the attachment automatically folds the fabric, so no ironing is required. On a workwear production line, the need to step on the iron is unacceptable.

3. Freedom of pattern placement : When arranging patterns like a puzzle to reduce costs, the restriction of "using the selvedge" becomes a hindrance. As a result of cutting without paying attention to the selvedge, the selvedge ended up being mixed in only with the pieces placed on the edge.

4. Consideration of strength : Splitting the fabric inevitably reduces its strength. Even Levi's 501 jeans use thicker thread and chain stitching for the side seams to maintain their strength.

The stitch width of this machine is approximately 0.72 cm, which is equivalent to 9/32 inches in inches. This was a typical standard for Union Special sewing machines at the time.

I can picture the roar of a Union Special 35800 — a Feed-Off-the-Arm felling machine, designed to continuously sew heavy denim rolled seams.

Two buttons on the cuffs — a small discovery

Two buttons are attached to the cuffs parallel to the cuff line.

When you close the cuffs with the inner buttons, the distance from the sleeve opening changes, and the fabric expands and rolls in. In addition to the narrowness of the cuffs, this inward structure prevents wind from getting in.

I'm exaggerating a bit and thinking that this might be intentional, but when I consider the effort it takes to align the linear distances and adjust the position of the inner buttons, I might be overthinking it after all.

One more thing. The transition between the facings is offset from the transition between the facings. This is to avoid the so-called "rubbing" and to prevent the needle from breaking when sewing. It's nice to notice such attention to detail in invisible parts.

The buttons are engraved with the PAYDAY logo, and the surface is domed rather than flat. When I removed it, I found that it had two legs.

Sew the collar in one stroke

The process of attaching the collar involves an astonishing number of steps.

From the base stitch of the collar to the subsequent stitches, the thread is sewn in one continuous stroke without ever cutting it.

This type of design can be seen in vintage denim jackets. It may have been a kind of "common sense" for US workwear at the time. As proof of this, the overlapping stitching is done at the front edge of the collar, where it should be more visible.

If you ask whether it is beautiful by modern dress shirt standards, the answer is no.

However, this roughness can be transformed into "goodness" from a special perspective. It's not something that can be blindly accepted simply because it's "made in America in the old days." I think it's a specification that can be tolerated precisely because there is a clear intention and reason behind it, whether in the past or present.

In the days before automatic thread cutting, it was quicker to force the machine to turn by continuing to press the pedal, considering the time wasted by stopping the heavy sewing machine and inserting scissors. The answer to efficiency looks completely different depending on the era, environment, and factory equipment.

I think the stitching on the collar is the perfect solution for that moment, something that could only have existed in that era.

Historical Background — Workwear Competition in the 1950s

In the 1950s, America was in the midst of post-war economic recovery and consumer expansion. Major retail chains like JCPenney were expanding their stores across the US, and demand for mass-produced workwear was on the rise.

Amidst the proliferation of private brands, each company adopted a strategy of "visual differentiation." Levi's orange stitching, PAY DAY's red bar closure. Visual icons that could be recognized at a glance in stores sent a direct message to customers forced to make a choice in front of the display stand.

Summary — Rationality in Straight Lines

My honest impression after taking it apart was that while it does provide a certain degree of freedom of movement in the back that is unique to workwear, even though it is raglan, the sleeves are attached quite low down .

It is often said that raglan sleeves increase mobility, but I think that in some cases the purpose is to blur the shoulders to make them more suitable for everyone.

When you lay out the disassembled parts on a flat surface, something becomes apparent: the lines on the sides of the body are perfectly straight, as if they were drawn with a ruler.
The human body has varying curves and thickness, but this clothing ignores that.
The downward-pointing raglan sleeves and the linear boxy silhouette show that the design concept is not to make the body look beautiful, but to fit anyone, regardless of their body type, into the jacket, a concept similar to packaging.

Naturally, you will feel a sense of discomfort when you wear it. However, I don't think there are many people who would say that the discomfort felt in the manufacturing process at the time was due to the "production being sloppy."

It is within this unremarkable, straight line composition that we find the "rational choices" they made - what they prioritized and what they discarded.

So, it was fun again this time!!

PAY DAY Coverall 1950s That's it.