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.Touching on a broad-ranging host of topics-from the rise and fall of natural indigo dyes to the enduring mythos of the cowboy, from the explosion of youth culture in the Baby Boom era to the globalization of the textile industry and the erosion of American manufacturing-Jeans is a history of American culture as told through its pants.