Cadet Enlisted Service Cap?

[VPI18]

No, I do not intend to propose the wear of the service cap for cadet enlisted.


It's just that, I saw these two photos and it made me wonder...
Was this ever an authorized uniform item?
If so, when did they dump the idea of service caps for cadet enlisted?

[Major Carrales]

You have to ask yourself if it was a cadet item at all.  There was a time, I believe, when CAP Airman and NCOs existed in the Senior persuasion.

All speculation aside, I recall someone once posting here or at the "Portal" about wearing a service cap with a white band...giving it up as it become too cumbersome.

[Hawk200]

No, I do not intend to propose the wear of the service cap for cadet enlisted.
................

It's just that, I saw these two photos and it made me wonder...
Was this ever an authorized uniform item?
If so, when did they dump the idea of service caps for cadet enlisted?

Don't think they've ever had it. I'd have to dig through all the various uniform manuals, but I'm pretty sure the service cap was always a privilege of cadet officers. This looks like something that got tossed together as a concept, then it got passed around as "...an actual uniform item, I swear!"

Senior Member NCOs actually had their own service cap device. It was basically the flight cap device (the eagle is the exact same size) with a ring around the outside like the AF enlisted device, and a screw post on the back. I've got three of them on the original NS Meyer cards. It would be great if they used them again, but it would probably be a while before new ones would be available.

[BGNightfall]

I remember hearing at one point that the current cadet enlisted cap device was previously the cadet officer cap device.  Do not have any supporting documentation, though. 

[JohnKachenmeister]

I remember hearing at one point that the current cadet enlisted cap device was previously the cadet officer cap device.  Do not have any supporting documentation, though.

When was THAT?  The current cadet enlisted insignia has been around forever.  WIWAC it was sewn on the flight cap.  Cadet enlisted NEVER had a flying saucer hat, and it only came out for officers in I think 1964.

[Hawk200]

WIWAC it was sewn on the flight cap. 

I think I might have a couple of those sew ons in my collection, too.

[dogboy]

This is a Cadet Officer cap from the mid-1960's. It was up to Wing Commanders to authorize it. I was in NJ Wing and worn this cap after I earned my COP in 1965. Cadet EMs wore the flight cap with (usually) a sewn on patch.

We called it the Ice-Cream Man hat because of the white band.

[IceNine]

Highest probabability is that the owner of this cap didn't have the sew on version so threw the metal insignia on to create an authentic look

[dogboy]

Highest probabability is that the owner of this cap didn't have the sew on version so threw the metal insignia on to create an authentic look

No, only the metal badge was authorized for the service cap.

[PA Guy]

This is a cadet officer's cap from the 50's, early 60's.  Cadet officers were allowed to wear the "wheel hat" with the white band and metal cap device.  I wore one as a cadet C/2Lt in 1965.  The one shown is a poor example.  The white band is too wide and I never saw anyone wear one with a crush like that.  The metal cap device had a screw back and was only authorized for wear by cadet officers on that type of hat.  Cadet enlisted wore a similar cloth device on their flight cap.

Also worth noting are the buttons for the chin strap.  They are the old style worn until the late 60's, I think.  The service coats used this style of button also.

[Gunner C]

It was still authorized in 1969-70 WIWAC officer.  The thing that this picture is missing is the chn strap.  We only wore it a couple of times - it was a pain in the backside - you had to find a hat rack and the white band was a dirt magnet.

[Spike]

They did have it.  If you scrounge hard enough you can still come up with Cadet Airman Hat insignia with the post and screw fasteners designed for Service Caps.  I am not sure when they stopped making them, but they were common according to my 800 year old historian, who had a son that wore it.   

[Grumpy]

I only wore it for six months then I traded it for an active duty Air Force cover.  But I "stretched" the white band to cover the entire cap. (Little joke there)  Air Police wore white service caps.

[Pylon]

Gotta love the crusher caps.

[VPI18]

Thanks for the information, gentlemen. It's hard to imagine that cadet officers wore the "cookie" at a point in history.

[Major Carrales]

Gotta love the crusher caps.

Crush caps are made by removing the wire grommet that gives it its shape.  I have seen several army type service caps that had the stiffener permanently attached.  For some strange reason every USAF style service cap I have seen has the removable grommet, as if there is a hold old that crush caps might someday return.


I find it unlikely that there will ever be crush caps in the USAF and CAP, it is a look made of necessity.  As in WWII, service caps were worn and made to fold to be stuck in a pocket and to have headsets over them on the bombers.

In William Manchester's American Caesar, a biography of Douglas MacArthur, it states that MacArthur wore his cap crushed in WWII and that it later caught on with aviators suggesting that MacArthur was the prototype for the crushed look.  After he became Field Marshall of the Philippines his now iconic "brass hat" was worn in a crushed manner.

Wow...I guess posting like this means I may be more well read than I realized.  Can't have that catching on...heaven help us if people actually started citing their sources and bringing in the words of experts.  I mean really...there goes the neighborhood. 

[ZigZag911]

When I became a cadet officer in '71 the white band was no longer required.

[Gunner C]

They did have it.  If you scrounge hard enough you can still come up with Cadet Airman Hat insignia with the post and screw fasteners designed for Service Caps.  I am not sure when they stopped making them, but they were common according to my 800 year old historian, who had a son that wore it.   

Once again, it was for cadet officers, only.

[Flying Pig]

That has to be one of the ugliest uniform items I have ever seen.  I say it may even place up there with the maroon epaulets.

[Mitchell 1969]

Summing up and adding a bit:

The service cap was authorized for cadet officers only if approved by the Wing Commander (blanket approval - cadet officers weren't each required to seek it).  I am not aware of any that did not approve it, but who knows?

Anyway, it was as depicted, sort of.  The crusher look did happen, but probably only at local units as permitted by people who didn't know better.  Or care.

The cadet officer service cap had a white band and an enameled prop and wing cap device.  The white band was generally a woven item made for this purpose, same width as the band on the cap.  The one depicted is too wide, ribbed and generally cheesy looking, perhaps homemade.  And, the absence of the chin strap doesn't help the way it looks.

I know it was worn at least as early as 1965.  I wore it in 1970 and early 1971.  I believe the band was eliminated in 1971, BUT, the enameled device stayed the same.  I cannot remember wearing the current cadet officer device before I turned senior in 1973, but that could be simply due to not wearing a service cap much.

The cap device issue grew new legs when the band was removed.  The service cap, without it, looked plain - the "look" was based on the balance of device and white band.

As far back as 1970, the CAC in CA* had been recommending that the band be scrapped and the device be changed to something "more modern" and "more Air Force."  Comparisons were made with the AFROTC and AFJROTC devices.  The CA CAC* suggestion was to replace the device with a metal rendering of the eagle that was/is depicted on the cadet officer shoulder boards.  And so it was, some time mid-1970's.

After the new cadet officer device was adopted, the screw-back enameled device lived on as the device for the cadet enlisted female beret.

* I am not saying that this was a CA CAC thing only, so nobody has to write "Nuh-UH!  Yournamehere Wing CAC started it 3 days before that!"  Despite the absence of the Internet, Facebook and cell phones, cadets used to stay in touch with each other way back then, and great minds thought alike.  Could be possible that the suggestion was made at the exact same moment by all 50 CAC's,  for all I know.