Where can you find information to help you? The same places you find information about everything else in life. Interaction with other people, watching movies, reading books, and the internet are all full of a sea of facts and details. The difficulty will be discerning which are facts and which are opinions. Be judicious in giving credence to your sources of information.

The best quality sources are “primary sources.” These include books and other publications from your target era, as well as any surviving materials - though you must recognize that the dates assigned to these materials may have come out of the head of someone no more knowledgeable than yourself!! I regard even dates written or stamped on antiques as questionable, unless I see that the date is consistent with what I would expect. You must also realize that clothing and other daily use items were traditionally passed down if still useful - - and altered to current ideas if need be. In the case of clothing, look carefully for old seamlines and pieced joints, before you assume it’s in its original form.

Secondary sources would be, for instance, accounts written by others who were not present. These are more authoritative than tertiary sources, especially if corresponding closely in time with the artifact in question. But they are not the very best evidence. When combined together, however, they can be most useful.