In what might be an unprecedented query for Hoodline's mysteries-and-oddities department, we received a tip from across the pond.
Jamie H. from Islington, London, writes:
"A couple of months ago I bought a jacket from my local flea market here, simply because I thought it looked really cool. On the back in embroidered lettering, it says 'Ask For Duke, Westside, 1685 Haight St.'"
The jacket's label is similarly mysterious and apparently hand-sewn, reading simply, "Supa 66."
The address mentioned on the jacket, 1685 Haight St., is the current digs of LTD gallery, though employees of Loved To Death didn't have any insight on the former life of the storefront. City planning records also turned up no leads on the identity of Duke.
So, who is Duke? Our best guess, so far, is that the jacket is a nod to the inimitable Raoul Duke, pseudonym and alter-ego of former Haight denizen Hunter S. Thompson—though Thompson most famously lived at 318 Parnassus on Stanyan, not on Haight.
Who is Duke? What does the label say? What is Westside?
We don't know either, but we hope you do. Take it to the comments.
Update, 10:45am: Reader Devin M. suggests the jacket may have been worn by one of the youth jacket clubs in the Western Addition:
Do you know more about the jacket clubs, or from where the jacket might hail? Get in touch.