Where Cowboy Hat Crowns Got Their Names

Every crease in a cowboy hat crown means something. Most of them are named after the men who wore them first — ranchers, movie stars, gamblers, and one fictional Texas Ranger who changed hat history in 1989.

The Cattleman

The oldest and most common crown. Three creases — one down the center, one on each side. It started as a status symbol: ranch owners creased their hats this way to set themselves apart from the working hands. The center dent also made the hat easier to grab and pull off with one hand, which matters when the other one’s holding reins.

Today it’s the default. If you picture a cowboy hat, you’re picturing a cattleman crown.

The Gus

Here’s the one with the best story.

The tall, forward-sloping crown with the deep front pinch is named after Augustus “Gus” McCrae — Robert Duvall’s character in the 1989 miniseries Lonesome Dove. When the show aired, everybody wanted Gus’s hat. The crease was designed for the production by Manny Gammage of Texas Hatters, and the name stuck so hard it replaced whatever anyone called it before.

“The crease existed for years. It took a fictional Ranger to make it famous.”

And here’s the wrinkle: it wasn’t new. The same crease had been around for decades under different names. Stetson called it the Carlsbad crease. Steve McQueen wore essentially the same crown in Tom Horn (1980) — the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum has the actual hat. Before that, the old-timers called it the Tom Mix, after the silent-era western star. Lonesome Dove just gave it the name that finally stuck.

That’s how hat history works.

The Montana — Tom Mix

Close cousin to the Gus — high crown, three creases, but the back creases are smaller and the whole thing reads a little softer. Named for the state where ranch hands shaped it, and for Tom Mix, the movie cowboy who wore it on screen in the 1920s and ’30s and made it the fashionable hat of the era.

The Gambler

Low, flat-topped crown with a circular crease around the rim. It came north with the Mexican charros — the horsemen who worked ranches from South America up through Mexico and into Nevada. The low crown doesn’t trap hot air, which matters when you’re working cattle in August. Riverboat gamblers adopted it in the 1800s (hence the name), and Hollywood later decided it was the hat villains wear. Clint Eastwood wore one in The Outlaw Josey Wales.

The Pinch Front

Two dents pinched into the front of the crown, meeting in a teardrop or diamond. Less cowboy, more town — this is the crease that crossed over into fashion hats and fedoras. It’s the easiest crown to wear if you’ve never worn a western hat before.

The Brick

A squared-off, rectangular crease — like a cattleman that went to architecture school. Also called the Dakota in some circles. Modern, structured, and the one most likely to be curled at the brim.

The Open Crown

No crease at all. Rounded top, straight off the block. This is how every hat starts before somebody puts their thumbs in it — and plenty of old-timers never bothered. The open crown is the purest form of the hat, and shaping it yourself is half the point.

Every crown started as somebody’s practical solution — a way to grab the hat, shed the rain, or beat the heat. The names are just history remembering who did it first. Or in Gus’s case, who did it on television.