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184 IT TOOK NINE TAILORS
wear, and of course I had to have sweaters made to my own design.
Major E. D. Medcalfe, Equerry to the then Prince of Wales, explained to me that the really smart dressers of England thought that one firm of tailors turned out superior trousers while another was better at waistcoats and a third was expert at jackets. I was also told that the Prince would purchase a piece of material and have three different tailor shops work on the three different parts of a suit. This seemed to me to be carrying the art of dressing to a preposterous extreme, even for a Prince. I also heard that he had one bootmaker who made the upper part of his shoes while another attached the soles. I never quite believed that story; probably somebody was trying to pull my leg, as they say in England. When I finally met the Prince, I was tempted to inquire if it were true but lacked the nerve.
In delving into the habits of the British well-dressed man, I discovered that the old tailoring firms of London think the world revolves around the problem of proper attire for men. One time I went to Anderson and Sheppard to order a dress suit. With great ceremony they brought out a bolt of cloth that they said they reserved only for their very best customers.
"What is so special about this bolt?" I inquired.
"It is the same piece of material from which His Highness, the Prince, recently had a dress suit made."
I couldn't pass up anything like that, so I ordered the suit. I will say it is the most durable dress suit IVe ever owned.
As soon as I became a Paramount star, I began getting offers to endorse various products at fancy prices. I thought this was bad publicity, so I turned down all these offers. But one day Hank and I were walking along Seventh Avenue in Los Angeles when we happened to glance into the window of a cheap haberdashery. There was my picture, life-size, surrounded by a display of readytied bow ties. They were the kind that are sewed on the end of