Prefer to read in Dutch? Click here.
It’s hard for many to imagine, but searching for old work clothes in abandoned mines is a serious hobby for some people. A hobby where you can even earn a nice bit of extra cash. For example, a rare 19th-century work pants sell for over $87,000. But it was a very special pair…
The pants remain in remarkably good condition. Most work pants found in mines have large holes or missing parts. But these jeans have only one hole, which someone patched with a piece of cloth. Click the right arrow in the photo above to see more details of the pants.
Rare 19th-century work pants sell for over $87,000
Michael Harris, a self-proclaimed ‘denim archaeologist’, discovered the Levi’s work pants about five years ago. Over the course of five years, he explored around 50 abandoned mines in Western America. This pair stood out as the only one from his finds that still looked so good.
And people are willing to pay serious money for that, as an auction shows. The pants sold for $87,400. Kyle Hautner and Zip Stevenson are the new owners.
Stevenson has run a denim repair shop in Los Angeles for almost three decades. He says the pants are still good enough to wear and only need reinforcement in a few areas.
Stevenson envisions famous men like Johnny Depp or Jason Momoa wearing these pants. But he prefers to eventually sell them to a museum. His preference is for the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
The dark past of these rare 19th-century work pants
As exciting as it may be to acquire such an old piece of clothing, the pants carry a dark history. A label in the inside pocket reads: “The only kind made by White Labour.”
A Levi’s employee explained in an interview with The Wall Street Journal that this label refers to the Chinese Exclusion Act. U.S. President Chester A. Arthur signed this law into effect on May 6, 1882. For ten years, the law prohibited the admission of Chinese workers. Even before the law passed, various anti-Chinese policies had already been implemented, and violence against this group had increased.
Although the law was originally intended to last ten years, the government renewed it in 1892 and later made it permanent in 1902. Diplomats, teachers, students, merchants, and travelers were the only ones who qualified for exceptions. It was not until 1943, when the law was replaced by the Magnuson Act, that Chinese immigrants were gradually admitted.
Work pants in mines
So why did workers leave their work pants in the mines? Well, several reasons explain this. For one, taking a pair of pants down was easier than bringing it back up, an extra task no one in the mines cared for. In addition, workers sometimes used old pants during work, tearing them into pieces to seal pipe joints.
In 1880, they probably never imagined that their pants would be worth so much today…
Best regards,
Aileen
Discover more from Prettybusiness World
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.