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Museum object · Jewelry and Adornment

Gray-brown feather hatband accessory worn by Cab Calloway

mid 20th-late 20th century

Smithsonian NMAAHC collection

COLLECTION RECORDImage not availableExplore the catalog description and source record.
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Source catalog description

This description refers to material held by Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture. Visual details below describe the original material.

A feather accessory for hatbands worn by Cab Calloway. The feather accessory is a small bundle of white, gray-brown, red, and white spotted black feathers with calamuses bound together with black tape. The trimmed white feather at the back has a white calamus, white rachis, white barbs, and white afterfeathers. The trimmed, fan-shaped feather stacked over the white feather has solid gray-brown barbs, afterfeathers, and a black rachis. Over the gray-brown feather is a thin, tall, red barbed feather with a red rachis that extends slightly above the top of the gray-brown feather. In the very front, near the taped wrapped base, is a fragment of a white speckled black feather. The white spots are mostly round with a couple of elliptical shaped ones down the center. The spots are divided by thin, light brown, lines that form a diamond pattern.

Sources & collection details

Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture — original record ↗

Source collection ↗

Catalog metadata · CC0 · Source checked 2026-10-13

Catalog reference: A2015.273.1.24.3

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