An Annual Timeline of Princeton Reunion Couture

While the photo exhibit in this “Reunion Costume Collection” is extensive, it is certainly not complete. The outfits currently depicted are far outnumbered by ones for which photos remain elusive. To get a fuller grasp of the historical scope & variety of P-rade attire, a deep dive into written P-rimary sources is the way to go.

Here, then, begins a descriptive chronology of costume characteristics cribbed from online copies of the Prince, the Alumni Weekly, and class reunion yearbooks. It itemizes available info about the whole range of costumes worn since Princetonians first donned them at the turn of the 20th Century. Along the way, it also lists some of the costume-related floats & stunts that classes have deployed in the P-rade.

This page serves as the entry point for a serial catalog of such information. Unlike the photo display, which is organized by class, this material is organized by reunion year. To keep it manageable, the timeline is broken down by decade.

To explore the origins of Princeton reunion garb, just click on the initial decade listed below. Additional decades will become available in coming months, as research in this frivolous field goes forward.

1900s “Costumes Commence, Floats Flourish”