Every U.S. Senator knows that sweltering summer days are much more civilized in a Seersucker suit, but few know the history of the tradition. Now, thanks to Mark Metzger at Highcliffe Clothiers in Middleburg, both the backstory and the very best seersucker are readily available.

In the years before air conditioning made summertime bearable, senators from the South taught their colleagues from other regions about proper attire in the swampy weather. Southern senators quickly shed their heavy wool black frock coats for lighter linen and cotton garments until 1907 when a New Orleans clothier made summer wear more comfortable by designing a light-weight suit in a pale blue and white striped rumpled fabric he called "seersucker," a word he created from the Persian words for "milk and sugar."

Seersucker suits became widely popular because they retained their fashionable good looks despite the frequent washing that hot, humid, dusty Washington demanded.

According to "The New Members' Guide to Traditions of the United States Senate" by Richard A. Baker, in the late 1990's, Mississippi Senator Trent Lott decided the time had come to revive a long-forgotten Senate sartorial tradition. He selected a nice and warm Thursday in the second or third week of June and named it "Seersucker Thursday." Lott's goal was simply to enliven the drab, predictable attire of senators, but it quickly gained popularity and members received warning in plenty of time to freshen up their seersucker suits.

In 2004, California Senator Diane Feinstein decided to encourage participation by the growing cadre of the Senate's woman members. "I would watch the men preening in the Senate," she said, "and I figured we should give them a little bit of a horse race." The following year, eleven of the fourteen women senators appeared in Seersucker Thursday in outfits received as gifts from Senator Feinstein.

Today senators volunteer to make this annual fashion statement in a spirit of good-humored harmony to remind their colleagues of what earlier Senates considered mandatory summer attire.

You'll find seersucker of the highest quality in impeccable shades of summer at Highcliffe Clothiers on Madison Street in Middleburg.