List of bow tie wearers

This is a list of notable bow tie wearers, real and fictional; notable people for whom the wearing of a bow tie (when not in formal dress) is also a notable characteristic.

A list of bow tie devotees reads like a Who's Who of rugged individualists.

—The New York Times ^[1]

Bow tie wearing can be a notable characteristic for an individual. Men's clothier Jack Freedman told The New York Times that wearing a bow tie "is a statement maker" that identifies a person as an individual because "it's not generally in fashion".^[1] Numerous writers and bow tie sellers have observed that the popularity of this type of neckwear can rise and fall with the fortunes of the well-known people who wear them.^[2][3]

In 1996, The Wall Street Journal quoted statistics from the Neckwear Association of America showing that bow ties represent 3 percent of the 100 million ties sold each year in the United States, most of them part of formal wear, such as a tuxedo.^[4]

Contents 1 Attention to famous bow tie wearers in commerce and fashion commentary 1.1 Celebrities' effect on bow tie wearing 1.2 Commercial interests using famous wearers to encourage sales 2 Bow tie wearers of the nineteenth century 3 Bow tie wearers in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries 3.1 Architects 3.2 Educators 3.2.1 College and university presidents 3.3 Entertainers and media personalities 3.3.1 Comedians 3.3.2 Journalists and commentators 3.3.3 Other entertainment personalities 3.4 Fashion designers 3.5 Lawyers 3.6 Politicians 3.7 Psychiatrists and psychologists 3.8 Other 20th-/21st-century people associated with wearing bow ties 4 Fictional characters 4.1 Characters in film and television 4.2 Characters in comics, cartoons, and anime 5 Notes

Attention to famous bow tie wearers in commerce and fashion commentary

Those who write about bow ties often mention famous people who wear or have worn them. These writers often make the point that the image conveyed to others by a bow tie can be affected by associations with celebrities and famous people in the past.

A common fashion accessory in the nineteenth century, the bow tie had positive associations by mid-twentieth century, bolstered by real-world personalities like President Franklin Roosevelt and the "political genius" Right Honourable Sir Winston Churchill as well as "devil-may-care" characters portrayed in movies by actors like Humphrey Bogart and Frank Sinatra.^[5] By the 1970s, however, the bow tie became associated with nerds and geeks, such as the slapstick characters played by Jerry Lewis, and Mayberry's fictional deputy sheriff, Barney Fife. This perception was reinforced by the bow tie's association with Pee-wee Herman and U.S. Senator Paul Simon.^[6]

The perceptions associated with bow ties started to take another turn in the 1980s, when Success Magazine's founder, W. Clement Stone, spoke out in support of the neck wear after the publication by fashion author John Molloy which observed, "Wear a bow tie and nobody will take you seriously."^[7] Stone associated bow-tie wearing with virility, aggressiveness, and salesmanship.^[8][9] In further defense of the bow tie, its use by figures such as Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Saul Bellow has been cited.^[10]

Celebrities' effect on bow tie wearing

When a celebrity is noticed wearing a bow tie, it can affect bow tie sales; sales see an improvement when the accessory is associated with younger celebrities such as Tucker Carlson. When Raj Bhakta wore one during his stint on The Apprentice, haberdashers reported customers asking for a bow tie which looked like his.^[2] Similarly, after Matt Smith made his debut as the bow tie-wearing Eleventh Doctor in Doctor Who, Topman reported a significant increase in demand for bow ties (from 3% of all tie sales to 14%).^[11]

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. wrote about his decision as a college student to start wearing bow ties in his memoir A Life in the Twentieth Century: Innocent Beginnings, 1917–1950. Schlesinger remarked that he made his decision in part because a number of famous men he admired had a penchant for the neck wear. In addition, he noted that they prevent dinner mishaps, saying, "It is impossible, or at least it requires extreme agility, to spill anything on a bow tie."^[12]

Commercial interests using famous wearers to encourage sales

Bow tie sellers often cite famous people who have worn the neckwear as a way of encouraging more customers. Jack Cutone, co-founder of Boston Bow Tie, noted that there is ample evidence to support the uniqueness and stature of those who wear bow ties, including Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, Albert Einstein and Sigmund Freud.^[13] Beau Ties Ltd., an online bow tie seller, has featured a "C. Everett Koop bow tie," complete with an endorsement by Koop, who was Surgeon General of the United States during the Reagan administration.^[14] Carrot & Gibbs, another bow tie seller, lists several famous wearers on its bow tie web page.^[15]

Bow tie wearers of the nineteenth century

Bow ties were conventional attire in the nineteenth century. Honoré de Balzac has been quoted as saying that manner in which a man tied his bow tie distinguished "a man of genius from a mediocre one".^[16] Portraits of U.S. presidents from Van Buren through McKinley commonly show them in bow ties. Wearing of a bow tie was seldom commented upon and did not form part of the public perception of figures such as American inventor Thomas Edison or Communist theorist Karl Marx.^[17]

Bow tie wearers in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries

Architects

• Le Corbusier (1887–1965), architect who wore "his trademark bow tie"^[18]
• Peter Eisenman (born 1932), architect and academic^{[19][20][21][22]}
• Louis Kahn (1901 or 1902–1974), architect and academic^[23]
• Walter Gropius (1883–1969), architect, six of whose bow ties are kept by Harvard^[24]

Educators

College and university presidents

• Leon Botstein, president of Bard College^[25][26]
• Dr. George S Bridges, Whitman College president^[27][28]
• George Campbell Jr., president of Cooper Union^[29]
• William Durden, president of Dickinson College^[30]
• E. Gordon Gee, president of Ohio State University and former president of Vanderbilt University, Brown University, the University of Colorado at Boulder, and West Virginia University: "When E. Gordon Gee was fifteen years old, he made a defining sartorial decision. He began wearing a bow tie."^[31]
• R. Bowen Loftin, president of Texas A&M University. Quoted as saying "The similarity between Bowen and Bowtie tends to help people remember my name."^[32][33]
• Michael C. Maxey, 11th president of Roanoke College^[34]
• Dr. Andrew Sorensen, former president of the University of Alabama and the University of South Carolina, capitalized on his reputation for a "trademark bow tie" by calling his travels around South Carolina "Bow Tie Bus Tours".^[35][36]

====Other educators====

• Daniel J. Boorstin (1914–2004), U.S. historian, professor, attorney, and writer who was the U.S. Librarian of Congress from 1975 until 1987.^[37]
• Eric R. Kandel, neurobiology professor and Nobel Prize winner with a "trademark bow tie"^[38]
• Bill Nye, television science program host, is a "gangly guy in the blue lab coat and bow tie".^[39] On why he wears bow ties: "If you're working with liquid nitrogen and your tie falls into it, it's funny in a way to the audience but it's also — pun intended — a little bit of a pain in the neck."^[40]
• Dr. Thomas Leuze link title Associate Professor of Christian Education and Religious Studies at Chapman Seminary of Oakland City University in Oakland City, Indiana.
• Alexander Oparin, a Soviet biochemist notable for his contributions to the theory of the origin of life.^[41]
• Murray Rothbard, libertarian thinker who "always wore a conservative suit and bow tie."^[42]
• Paul Samuelson (1915–2009), professor emeritus of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a Nobel Prize winner.^[43][44]
• Arthur Schlesinger, Jr., "famed for his trademark bow ties"^[45][46]
• Chris Whittle, founder of Channel One News and Edison Schools^[47][48]

Entertainers and media personalities

Comedians

• Fred Allen, American radio and TV comedian ^[49]
• Charlie Chaplin, renowned comic actor of the silent film era^[1]
• Fyvush Finkel, comedic actor best known for roles on TV series produced by David E. Kelley, is sometimes nicknamed "Bowtie Finkel"^[50]
• Pee-wee Herman, played by Paul Reubens^[51]
• Stan Laurel, comedian, typically wore a bow tie when in character^[52][53]
• Jerry Lewis ("in nutty character")^[17][53][54]
• Groucho Marx American comedian^[55]
• Garry Moore, comedian who hosted game and variety shows, was known for his crew cut and bow ties.^[56][57][58]
• Frank Muir, British comedy writer and broadcast personality "famous for his pink bow tie and mispronunciation", according to the BBC^[53][59]
• Mo Rocca, identified by the New York Times as one of several comedians who have worn bow ties "ironically"^[1]
• Mark Russell, American political comedian, pianist, and parody song author. "Mr. Russell knows from bow ties. They have been his signature for years, along with a star-spangled piano that he plinks every few minutes ..."^[60]

Journalists and commentators

• Tucker Carlson, conservative American commentator.^[2][61] In 2005 he told the New York Times he had consistently worn bow ties since childhood, but he acknowledged that bow ties often provoke negative reactions, "like a middle finger protruding from your neck."^[1] Following his tenure on CNN's Crossfire (Jon Stewart famously knocked the bowtie during his infamous 2004 appearance on the show), he has switched primarily to long neckties or no ties at all.
• John Daly, journalist and host of What's My Line?, was often photographed in a bow tie;^[62] evening dress (which included bow ties) was worn by the host and panelists on that game show.^[63]
• Sir Robin Day (1923–2000), British television commentator and interviewer; his BBC News obituary said "With his thick horn-rimmed spectacles and trade mark polka-dot bow tie, he was the great inquisitor"^[64]
• Troy Dungan, retired chief weather anchor for WFAA-TV (ABC) in Dallas-Fort Worth. Owns approximately 220 bow ties.^[65]
• Dave Garroway (1913–1982), U.S. broadcaster, first host of the Today show^[66][67]

• Roger Kimball (born 1953), U.S. art critic and social commentator, co-editor and co-publisher of The New Criterion and publisher of Encounter Books ^[68]
• Janusz Korwin-Mikke (born 1942), Polish liberal conservative publisher and politician^[69]
• Irving R. Levine (1922–2009), the first foreign correspondent accredited in the Soviet Union.,^[70][71][72] the former economics reporter for NBC television, known for his "trademark bow tie", appeared for the first time in public wearing a necktie for the Brown University commencement in 1994. "I needed help in tying it," he later said.^[73]
• Russell Lynes (1910–1991), American art historian, photographer, author and editor of Harper's Magazine^[74]
• Tom Oliphant, writer for the Boston Globe
• Charles Osgood (born 1933), American broadcast journalist, described as having a "trademark bow tie"^[75][76]
• Matthew Parvis, editor-in-chief of PokerNews.com
• Gene Shalit (born 1926), U.S. movie critic and regular commentator on the Today show^[77][78][79]
• Harry Smith (born 1951), TV journalist, wore a "trademark" bow tie during his early career at a Denver station, but stopped wearing them when he joined CBS in 1987, when a network official told him that Charles Osgood was CBS' bow-tie-wearing personality and "We can't have two guys wearing bow ties." ^[80]
• George Will (born 1941), American conservative syndicated columnist and regular on the This Week Sunday morning program on ABC television. He sometimes appears with a bow tie, sometimes with a long tie, as can be seen on the covers of his books. In 2005, he told the New York Times that whenever he wore a regular necktie, people commented on the absence of his bow tie.^[1]

Other entertainment personalities

• Fred Astaire^[1]
• Raj Bhakta, 2005 contestant on The Apprentice television program, later ran for Congress and lost^[2]
• Bud Collyer, American television game show host in the 1950s and early 1960s, typically wore a bow tie^[81][82]
• Keith Floyd, bon viveur, restauranteur and TV chef.^[83]
• John Houseman, actor ^[54]
• Vladimir Horowitz (1903–1989), pianist, wore a "trademark bow tie."^[54][84]
• Christopher Kimball, cooking writer and TV host^[85][86]
• Matthew Lesko, American author and late-night television personality whose customary garish outfits include bowties ^[87]

Fashion designers

• Manolo Blahnik, shoe designer, sports a "signature bow tie"^[88][89]
• Alber Elbaz (born 1961), Israeli fashion designer "is always photographed wearing a floppy bow tie."^[16]
• Karl Lagerfeld, influential fashion designer^[90]

Lawyers

• Archibald Cox (1912–2004), the Watergate special prosecutor, constantly wore "his trademark bow tie, neatly knotted as always"^[70][91]
• Edward H. Levi (1911–2000), United States Attorney General, described by The New York Times as looking unready for political combat in "his signature bow tie and thick glasses".^[92]
• Louis Lowenstein (1925–2009), professor at Columbia University School of Law^[93]
• John Paul Stevens (born 1920), U.S. Supreme Court Justice who "rarely, if ever, wears any other neckwear on the bench"^[94]
• Joseph N. Welch (1890–1960), head attorney for the U.S. Army in the Army–McCarthy hearings of the 1950s^[95][96]

Politicians

The regular wearing of bow ties by a politician is often the subject of comment — from friends, foes and journalists:

• Thomas J. Bliley, Jr. (born 1932), former U.S. Representative from Virginia.^[4][97]
• Earl Blumenauer (born 1948), U.S. Representative from Oregon, wears "his trademark bow tie"^[98]
• Winston Churchill^[10][13][99]
• Elio Di Rupo, Belgian prime minister, once described by a reporter as "the bow tie wearing Socialist"^[100]
• Toomas Hendrik Ilves, president of Estonia, is "well-known for always sporting his trademark bow tie"; has even been "dubbed an 'American in a bow tie' by his opponents".^[101]

• Daniel Patrick Moynihan, U.S. Senator from New York, whom Hillary Clinton remembered in a speech as having had "three signature items: his horn rimmed glasses, a bow tie, and a great idea"^[10][102]
• Lester B. Pearson, Canadian leader, "with his trademark blue polka dot blue" bow tie^[99][103]
• Theodore Roosevelt^[1]
• George Schultz, U.S. Secretary of Labor, the Treasury, and State^[54]
• Paul Simon, U.S. senator from Illinois^{[10][54][104]}
• Donald Tsang, current Chief Executive of Hong Kong — "The bow tie is such an integral part of Tsang's identity that he is nicknamed "bow tie Tsang," according to an Associated Press story^[105]
• Julio César Turbay Ayala, president of Colombia from 1978 to 1982.^[106][107]
• Daniel Turp, Canadian Parti Québécois politician, formerly known ffor wearing bow ties.^[108]
• Anthony A. Williams, former mayor of Washington, D.C. and nicknamed "Mr. Bow Tie"^[109]
• G. Mennen Williams, former Governor of the State of Michigan.
• Woodrow Wyatt, a British Labour politician, published author, journalist and broadcaster^[110]

Psychiatrists and psychologists

• Aaron T. Beck, the psychiatrist known as "the father of cognitive therapy" dresses in "his signature bow tie"^[111]
• Alfred Kinsey, the influential sex researcher, wore a "trademark bow tie"^[112]

Other 20th-/21st-century people associated with wearing bow ties

• Saul Bellow, who often wore one late in life^[10]
• Frank Cashen, longtime Major League Baseball executive with the Baltimore Orioles and New York Mets.^[113]
• Aleister Crowley, English occultist, often wore extravagant bowties.^[114]
• Robert Denning, interior designer, wore bow ties exclusively the last fourteen years of his life.^[115]
• Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam organization^[10][53]
• Ace Greenberg, former CEO and Chairman of Bear Stearns^[116]
• Steve Jobs, Apple Computer founder, wore bow ties in the 1980s^[117]
• Dhani Jones,professional football player, sports one^[2]
• C. Everett Koop, former U.S. Surgeon General known for his "omnipresent red bow tie"^[61][118]
• Tim Lincecum, pitcher for baseball's San Francisco Giants^[119]
• Jim Phelan, basketball coach for Mount St. Mary's University. Numerous fans and fellow coaches honored his retirement by wearing bow ties.^[120]
• Howard Phillips, spokesman for Nintendo as well as first editor of Nintendo Power magazine from the early 1980s until 1991^[121]
• Orville Redenbacher (1907–1995), owner of an American popcorn business who appeared in commercials for it and had his image on the boxes — always wearing horn-rimmed glasses and a bow tie.^[122][61]
• Jim Rogers (born 1942), author^[123]
• George P. Shultz (born 1920), consistently wore bow ties in the early 1970s^[70]
• W. Clement Stone (1902–2002), businessman and philanthropist, had a collection of 250 bow ties.^[9]
• Bill Torrey (born 1934), General manager who built the New York Islanders into a dynasty that won four consecutive Stanley Cups, known as "Bow-Tie" Bill, after the signature bow tie he always wore.^[124]
• Lee Tressel, college football coach at Baldwin–Wallace College and a hall-of-fame member; described as "a cerebral coach who always wore a bow tie and a buzzcut,"^[125]
• Timothy White (1952–2002), rock journalist and "debonair dandy who prided himself in his jaunty bow tie and white buckskin shoes" according to his obituary in The Independent^[126]
• Mohammad Khalil, a talented Indian student hailing from Patna, has been rumoured to have endorsed the bow tie as part of his everyday wear. He has been reported wearing the bow tie as part of traditional Indian dress, on T-shirts, on his night suit, on his business suit and on the traditional Arab thawb. Fashion designers predict that he will send the Western world into the next fashion craze, termed "Khalil bow-tie mania"

Fictional characters

Bow ties are a consistent element in the depiction of some fictional characters.

Characters in film and television

Film and television characters portrayed by human actors as consistently wearing bow ties have included:

• Billy Bunter, a character in the works of Charles Hamilton^[127]
• Chuck Bass, a character in Gossip Girl known for his dandy sense of style, is often seen sporting a bow tie with a matching pocket square
• Bertram Cooper, a character in the drama series Mad Men who is never seen without a bow tie.^[128]
• The Doctor, central character of Doctor Who, in his second, third and eleventh incarnations.^[129][130] Actor Matt Smith pressed for the bow tie in his characterisation who regularly declares that "bow ties are cool".^[131]
• Dr. Donald "Ducky" Mallard, M.D., M.E. the Chief Medical Examiner in NCIS is always seen wearing a bow tie of various colors.^[132]
• Brother Mouzone, the enforcer who appears in The Wire television series, wears a "trademark suit and bowtie" and glasses, consistent with his image of being "more like a banker or entrepreneur or scholar" than a hitman.^[133]
• Les Nessman, character in WKRP in Cincinnati television sitcom ^[134]
• Hercule Poirot, fictional detective^[135]

Characters in comics, cartoons, and anime

Bow ties are a consistent part of the depiction of many characters created by artists for entertainment media including comics, cartoons, and anime.

Among these are many Hanna-Barbera cartoon characters:

• Boo-Boo Bear^[136]
• The mouse Pixie and the cat Mr. Jinks in the cartoon Pixie and Dixie and Mr. Jinks^[137]
• Magilla Gorilla^[138]
• Huckleberry Hound^[139]
• Jerry, the mouse in Tom and Jerry (1975–1977)^[140]
• Snagglepuss, Hanna-Barbera cartoon character created in 1959, a pink anthropomorphic mountain lion.^[141]

Other artist-created characters consistently or frequently depicted in bow ties include:

• Bernard Bernoulli of the Maniac Mansion and Day of the Tentacle computer games.^[142]
• Dagwood Bumstead, character in Blondie comic strip^[143][144]
• The Cat in the Hat^[145]
• Donald Duck, Disney cartoon character^{[15][99][146]}
• Count Duckula always wore a red bow tie as part of his ensemble.^[147]
• Conan Edogawa, alias of character Jimmy Kudo in "Detective Conan" manga and anime comics^[148]
• Harvey, in the play and movie of the same name, the invisible, bow-tied, 6-foot rabbit whose portrait was shown in the play and movie with him wearing a bow tie^[149]
• Carl Fredricksen, the main character in the 2009 Pixar film, Up.^[150]
• Krusty the Clown, cartoon character in The Simpsons^[151]
• Leopold the Cat, the namesake of a Russian cartoon series, wears a bow tie, even when he goes swimming.^[152]
• Mickey Mouse^[53][153]
• Mister Peabody, the main character of Peabody's Improbable History.
• Franklin "Foggy" Nelson. In the Marvel Daredevil comics, Nelson is a lawyer, best friend and longtime business partner of blind lawyer Matthew M. Murdock (a.k.a. the masked vigilante Daredevil. Even though Foggy Nelson occasionally wears standard neckties, he is partial to bowties.^[154]
• Jimmy Olsen often was depicted wearing a bow tie in the comic titles Superman and Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen^[155]
• Opus the Penguin, character in Bloom County comic strip^[156]
• The Penguin, in Batman comics, movies and television program, except for the 1992 Batman Returns in which he wore a jabot^[157]
• Jack Point, character in Judge Dredd comic books.^[158] The bow tie is part of his clown-like clothing.
• Waylon Smithers, cartoon character in The Simpsons^[159]
• Moe Szyslak, cartoon character in The Simpsons^[160]
• Rich Uncle Pennybags, aka Mr. Monopoly, from the board game Monopoly is frequently shown wearing a bow tie.

Notes