Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2007/10/12

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Subject: [Leica] re: why do sailors have tattoos?
From: kcassidy at asc.upenn.edu (Kyle Cassidy)
Date: Fri Oct 12 10:47:58 2007
 
dan asked:


>Is there some reason why seamen have a penchant for tattoos?  Popeye is
>depicted to carry one too!

I think, Dan, it's because sailors were the the only Europeans and Americans 
who traveled to Polynesia where it was popular among the locals. A lot of 
the early tattoos were done in Fiji and places like that, it showed that the 
sailor was a world  traveler, that he'd been to exotic places, etc.

The younger sailors (the WWII vets I talked to) spoke of the pre-war sailors 
having many tattoos and that as youngsters (17 years old or so) they wanted 
to get tattoos to be like the old guys. 

kc