The story of America"s best-loved garment, from the humble pants Levi Strauss sold to California miners in the 1870s to big-city socialites spending big money?$300 and up?for premium jeans today Since their emergence over a century and a half ago, blue jeans have been worn by every segment of American society, and exported around the world as a symbol of our civilization. In Jeans , James Sullivan traces the evolution of jeans from a simple utilitarian garment into what fashion critics have called ?the American uniform,? the very embodiment of our society"s ethos. Beginning with the adoption of front-buckled trousers as a style of dress in nineteenth-century America (derided as ?fornication pants? by Mormon leader Brigham Young), Sullivan tells the story of the riveted blue jeans" humble origin as ?waist overall? work pants. He then follows their mass production by such regional entrepreneurs as San Francisco"s legendary...