I remember buying button-fly Levis that were as stiff as boards. They would stand up by themselves if propped up against something.
You bought the waist a size or two too big and the length at least two sizes large. They had to be washed separately the first time or two because they bled dye.
They might have been bullet-proof the first couple weeks.
Shrink-to-fit button-fly 501 blues.
I bought mine in 34 X 38 size
They still make them.
Called “Rigid”. Not the same gauge denim as in the 40/50’s though.
Wrangler has some very heavy denim
Lol....did you dry them in the dryer, or with the wire inserts, on the clothes line?
I partially paid for college back in the late ‘60’s selling Levi’s for an outfit called Miller’s Surplus in SoCal. We would always tell out customers that the button fly 501’s had to be bought an inch bigger in the waist and two inches longer than their normal size. I folded and stocked so many pairs of those that my hands would turn blue.....
I loved 501’s then....now it’s Wranglers.
My mom always said the old levis that you could hold up to a light and not see any light through in the fabric were the best kind. She believed they were made of better material.
1890 Levis cost about $1.80.
1962 Levis cost about $2.60.
Today’s Levis, now made in various foreign nations, cost about $30-40.
Figure the inflation rate for those years!
My wife worked for Cone Mills. She would bring home pumice from the stone-washing of denim and I would put it in the garden to ward of snails.