Eastman Leather Clothing

EASTMAN SFAD type B-3 owned by our good friend .co alongside one of his wonderful, hand crafted Punjab belts, of which I can testify are a fantastic investment that get better and better with age!

Masters of the Air vignette at the EASTMAN Showroom, including our 100th BG Gen. Harold Q. Huglin grouping including his actual wartime A-2 and other issued apparel.

The equally fantastic and portraying Major Gale ‘Buck’ Cleven and Major Everett Blakely respectively in Masters of the Air.

The Devil is in the details

Buzz Ricksons C-2 sweater worn by in Masters Of The Air

With much focus currently on USAAF flight gear, let us not forget about the RAF and the fantastic early pattern RAF flight jacket, our EASTMAN ‘Fly Weight’ model shown here.

Originally designed by parachute pioneer Leslie Irvin in the early 1930s, the RAF sheepskin flying jacket was the only issue flying jacket made from animal skin in the service. The design was approved by the Air Ministry in 1932, and although often referred to as the ‘Irvin’ its production was contracted out to many manufacturers in order to meet demand.

The pre and early war jackets were manufactured with undivided one-piece body and sleeve panels. This was a somewhat extravagant way of producing the garment because each body panel needed an entire skin to cut if from. This meant a lot of the surrounding part of the skin was wasted.

However, from an aesthetic point of view, this method of construction made a very clean-line looking garment due to it having fewer seams. RAF jackets were only made this way in the pre, and early war period - in subsequent years the design had it’s full-piece panel construction subdivided into a greater number of panels to make it more economical to produce.

As collector items today, original RAF flying jackets are very desirable - particularly the earlier (full-piece panel) construction examples, not least because they are synonymous with the famous Battle of Britain. In the summer of 1940 (when this particular battle took place), only jackets made in the early configuration existed. So they are often referred to as ‘Battle of Britain’ jackets.

However, within the period of production of these ‘early spec’ jackets (mid 30s - 1940), there were also some other subtle distinctions between various contracts that were produced throughout those years. They were not necessarily intended, but nevertheless they existed. It was most probably due to skins being sourced from a multitude of suppliers in order to meet the demand, and as such skins from various breeds were procured without any emphasis on which ones could be used. There are dozens of different breeds of sheep, and the difference between the characteristics and nature of them is wide.

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Behind the scenes! What a wonderful job everyone involved with Masters did to bring the 100th’s epic tale to life! We’re honoured to be involved in such a labour of love.

Josiah Cross portrays Lt. Richard Macon in Masters of the Air, seen here wearing an EASTMAN ‘Roughwear’ type B-10.

Following on from previous post. Period archive images of various B5 and B6 flight helmet configurations.

Along with all the flight jackets and trousers we supplied for Masters Of The Air, we also supplied many other garments which included all of the flight helmets for the bomber crews. Naturally this production called for the highest level of authenticity, so we brought our knowledge to the table with the costume department and showed them what they needed in the way of flight helmets if they wanted to depict this show accurately. They said they did, so we went about the task of recreating numerous configurations for them that would have typically been seen in the ETO during this period. There are actually even more than this, but it wasn't necessary to do every conceivable one - just a good smattering of several different versions was plenty authentic enough. (Bear in mind this is just the sheepskin helmets - we did all the same again with the fabric A-9s - that will be for another post coming soon ;)

USAAF air-crews in Europe had a variety of different flight helmet models in use. Covered here are the two sheepskin models you see in Masters which were the most typical used in the ETO - The TYPE B-5 and TYPE B-6.

The Type B-5 was standardised in 1933 and wasn’t superseded until 1941 by the Type B-6. The two models are very similar in appearance.

The B-5s are a slightly lighter shade of brown with a reddish hue (often referred to as 'Redskin' in the collectors market). The B-6 was the typical dark brown. It also has the addition of bent-wire hooks distributed over the outside which were for attaching the A-9 oxygen mask. Ironically, it was a mask that was virtually obsolete by the time air-crews arrived in England, and therefore were not necessary as the crews by then were being issued A-10s.

The helmets were produced by civilian manufacturers under government contracts, and they were delivered without ear-cups or press-studs for attaching earphones and masks. These were added at the Air Bases later.

As a consequence, not only were there two sheepskin helmet types in circulation within the USAAF, but also a variety of different ear-cup types as each base had to improvise with what parts they had available from their stores. They were sewn on by the riggers.

In archive images of air-crews in the ETO a mixture of all these different types of configurations can be observed, so this needed to be emulated in the Masters production.

To this end, we produced more than 150 sheepskin flight helmets of both the B-5 and B-6 designs, along with multiple versions of ear-cup and stud configurations.

To my knowledge, this has never been undertaken in any wartime film production before, and certainly not to this level of authenticity.

The headgear set-ups in Masters are extremely accurate, and portray the variety of configurations that can be seen being worn by groups like the 100th.

A truck load of Eastman!
Masters Of The Air
- Sheepskin Type B3 jackets
- Sheepskin Type B2 caps
- Leather Type A2 jacket
- Original A9 flight helmet with correct authentic rubber earpieces added.

portrays Captain James Douglass in Masters of the Air, a bombardier on ‘Just a Snappin’, piloting the aircraft through the last moments of each bombing run. On the Bremen raid, flak tore though the B-17’s nose seconds before the target point, Douglass held firm, controlling the aircraft through his Norton bomb sight and delivered the payload on target. The mission would end up with his aircraft crash landing into a tree.

As the third episode of Masters released yesterday we see the 100th get a new commanding officer - Colonel Neil ‘Chick’ Harding.

A graduate of West Point and Kelly Field Advanced Flying School, Harding was held in very high esteem by the 100th personnel, especially the early original members of the group.

He was commander during the most challenging period for the 100th after he took over from Col. Huglin in the summer of ‘43. From then and on through the rest of ‘43 (which included ‘Black Week’) the 100th experienced inordinate losses, by comparison which earned them the unenviable nickname ‘Bloody Hundreth’.

Harding shouldered the responsibility for the group through this period which caused him extreme psychological distress. There was no other C/O of the Hundredth who was more respected than Harding.

James Murray (The Crown) portrays Col. Harding with outstanding authenticity in Masters and I had the sincere pleasure of meeting him at the premiere in London a couple of weeks ago after some previous communication.

Jim is the most charming fellow and with a great sense of humour - he had me laughing even when we had the photo taken as he kindly crouched to help level up our disparity in height. He co-founded the Murray Parish Trust with his wife, which is a Paediatric Intensive Care Unit charity. He is an avid enthusiast of Britain’s waterways for which he shows particular concern for their ecological preservation.

He’s also the proud owner of an Eastman A2 jacket - and I’m not referring to the one he wears in Masters, although mighty fine he looks in it - he has his very own 😉.

As Masters Of The Air continues today with part 3 the media have been showing a lot of interest.

Several magazine articles have done pieces on it. In the WMD magazine Costume Designer Colleen Atwood talks about how she collaborated with us on the flight jackets we made for the production. In particular the collar shape she selected for most of the A2 styles. This collar shape is the one found on the A2 contract made by the Monarch Manufacturing Co of Milwaukee Wisconsin.

The A2 jacket was conceived in 1931, and from then until 1943 it was regulation standard issue for USAAF aircrew and in that time more than 20 different manufacturers were contracted to make the style with Monarch being one of them.

The Monarch collar shape is quite distinctive in that it has deep collar point lobes, with slightly rounded tips giving it a nice smart appearance. Colleen really liked this feature so the majority of the A2s we made for Masters had this collar shape on them. It was fortunate for production that this feature was chosen as we already offered a Monarch model A2 as part of our Original Maker jacket category, so it was no problem for us to put this feature onto the MOTA A-2s.

who portrays Col. ‘Chick’ Harding (c/o of the 100th BG) shows this model of A2 off very well in the accompanying images.

portrays 100th BG pilot Lt Curtis Rundle Biddick in the Apple TV series Masters of the Air.

On July 24, 1943, Biddick piloted B-17 42-30184, nicknamed “Muggs’”, on a twelve-hour mission to Trondjheim, the first Eighth Air Force attack on a Norwegian target. On his return, Biddick crash-landed in the vegetable patch of an RAF commanding officer in Aberdeen. The crew were returned to Thorpe Abbotts the following day.

On August 17, 1943, Biddick’s B-17 42-5860 “Escape Kit’” took part in a mission to Regensburg. The 100th Bomb Group was assigned to “coffin corner”, so called for its vulnerable position at the rear of the formation. Approximately 40 miles north of Regensburg, Biddick’s plane suffered an oxygen fire caused by 20mm damage to the nose and fuselage, trapping those on the flight deck. Four of the crew were killed in action, including Lt Biddick.