T

he T-shirt did not start out as fashionable outerwear. Rather, back in the early 1900s, T-shirts were plain white underwear, worn by members of the US Navy to cover their chest hairs. At that time, exposing one's chest hair was regarded as inappropriate - as was wearing a T-shirt on the outside.

T-shirt lovers today have actors Clark Gable, Marlon Brando and James Dean to thank for breaking the norms and popularizing the T-shirt as outerwear.

It was Gable who first stripped off his T-shirt in the 1934 movie It Happened One Night. As women swooned for the bare-chested Gable, men followed suit, and from the late 1930s, the T-shirt became popular as outerwear in sports and campus events.

Among the most famous printed T-shirts in the item's early history are The Wizard of Oz promotional T-shirt (1939) and "Dew-It With Dewey" campaign T-shirt (1948) made by former New York governor Thomas E. Dewey, who was running for president that at the time.

The T-shirt's international popularity really took off in the 1950s when Brando followed Gable's move, stripping off his T-shirt in A Streetcar Named Desire in 1951. In 1955, the T-shirt discovered its rebellious rock-n-roll side when heartthrob Dean wore a tight white T-shirt underneath his leather jacket in the movie Rebel Without A Cause. T-shirt fever started to infect people across the globe.

The 1960s were marked by the colorful tie-dye T-shirts introduced by the hippies. Printed T-shirts displaying flowers, peace signs and message boards for personal feelings were also popular at that time. In the late 1960s to 1970s, music groups started to realize they could make a profit from selling T-shirts with their names. Also taking advantage of the T-shirt's popularity was Walt Disney, who started selling T-shirts as merchandise in the 1960s. In the late 1970s, the T-shirt showed its serious face, with political designs marking a new era in T-shirt culture.

In the past decade, the popularity of T-shirts as a central item in contemporary fashion was given another boost with the development of more sophisticated digital graphic programs, allowing manufacturers - and ordinary people at home - to create more designs. And, since then, it has been easy for us to find a T-shirt that matches our style and personality. If not, we can simply make one of our own.