Fashion Boundaries

A man from Texas arranges chairs before a small town campaign event in Iowa. He wears a cowboy hat.

     Where is the fashion boundary separating cowboy hats and baseball caps?
     Here in New England, nobody wears cowboy hats. Baseball caps are popular. The same is true for other states east of the Mississippi River. Some people wear cowboy hats to country music clubs, but that is different than everyday use. 
     Even after crossing west of the Mississippi River, baseball caps are the norm. At least that's my observation after traveling thousands of miles by car.
     The hat boundary starts at the Louisiana / Texas line. Cowboy hats are synonymous with Texas.
     I don't know where the boundary passes through the middle of the country. I suspect it zigs and zags.
     Farther to the north, the Missouri River might represent the demarcation between baseball caps and cowboy hats. Landscape is the reason. While crossing the river westbound in South Dakota, I noticed an immediate change from cropland to cattle range. Ranchers work on rangeland. They prefer cowboy hats.
     I'm not familiar with hat styles in the west coast states. I suspect that most people living near the Pacific Ocean don't wear cowboy hats. But ranchers inland and Hispanic Americans might wear them.
     I'm glad that cowboy hats are regional instead of everywhere. A hodgepodge beats homogenization. 

Farmers in Iowa listen to a speaker. They wear baseball caps.