Zoot suit Zoot suit A zoot suit (occasionally spelled zuit suit) is a men's suit with high-waisted, wide-legged, tight-cuffed, ged trousers, and a long coat with wide lapels and wide padded shoulders. This style of clothing became especially popular among the Latino, African American, Italian American, and Filipino American communities during the 1940s. Some observers claim that the "Edwardian-look" suits with velvet lapels worn by Teddy Boys in Britain are a derivative of the zoot suit. Zoot suits were first associated with African Americans in urban communities such as Harlem, Chicago, and Detroit, but were made popular by jazz musicians in the
Pressure suit world record. On 28 September 1936 Squadron Leader F.R.D. Swain of the Royal Air Force set the official world altitude record at 49,967 feet in a Bristol Type 138 wearing a similar suit. In 1934, aviator Wiley Post, working with Russell S. Colley of the B.F. Goodrich Company, produced the world's first practical pressure suit. The suit's body had three layers: long underwear, a rubber air pressure bladder, and an outer suit of rubberized parachute fabric which was attached to a frame with arm and leg joints that allowed Post to operate aircraft controls and to walk to and from