The Andy Griffith Show: Barney Fife’s Return to Mayberry in an Aloha Shirt and Cardigan

Don Knotts as Barney Fife on The Andy Griffith Show (Episode 6.17: “The Return of Barney Fife”)

Vitals

Don Knotts as Barney Fife, bumbling Raleigh detective and former deputy sheriff

Mayberry, North Carolina, Fall 1965

Series: The Andy Griffith Show
Episode: “The Return of Barney Fife” (Episode 6.17)
Air Date: January 10, 1966
Director: Alan Rafkin
Creator: Sheldon Leonard
Costume Designer: Stanley Kufel

Background

Today would have been the 100th birthday of Don Knotts, born July 21, 1924 in Morgantown, West Virginia. The comedian who shares my birthday (though 68 years older) remains arguably best known for his celebrated role as the overly officious country deputy Barney Fife on The Andy Griffith Show, though he also appeared across the latter seasons of Three’s Company as wannabe swinger landlord Ralph Furley.

Knotts’ five Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series remains a record-setting amount in that category and was also the most wins for a performer in the same role in the same series until Julia Louis-Dreyfus’ sixth and final win for Veep in 2017. In addition, his characterization of Barney Fife was ranked ninth on TV Guide‘s 1999 list of the 50 Greatest TV Characters of All Time.

Despite the accolades, Knotts amicably left The Andy Griffith Show at the end of the fifth season to pursue his film career, but the in-universe explanation that Barney was hired as a detective in Raleigh allowed for the actor to occasionally return to the series, including his Emmy-winning performance in the sixth season’s “The Return of Barney Fife”.

Barney proudly drives into Mayberry in his Edsel convertible, where he’s greeted by his friend and former boss Sheriff Andy Taylor (Andy Griffith). The two anticipate attending their high school reunion—listed as the class of 1948 in on-screen banners, though the series previously established that the two had graduated in 1945; the latter date would make more sense, given their ages and the fact that both characters were said to have served in World War II.

What’d He Wear?

By the sixth season, The Andy Griffith Show had finally transitioned from black-and-white to color, a change that the wardrobe department made great use of when colorfully dressing the returning Barney Fife in the idiosyncratic combination of a Hawaiian shirt and open brown cardigan with his familiar well-worn straw hat and the trousers from his “old salt-and-pepper” tweed suit.

Barney’s red aloha shirt features a large-scaled white floral print. This style of “solid-color backgrounds and simple white floral patterns” (as defined by Aloha Spotter) is known as a “pareu print,” in tribute to Tahitian pareu wraps. The shirt has the traditional wide camp collar that lays flat, with a small loop extending from the left side that ostensibly coordinates with a button under the right collar leaf. The brown 2-hole buttons up the plain front are either genuine or imitation coconut, and there is a non-matched pocket over the left breast. Though Barney always wears his cardigan over his Hawaiian shirt, we can safely assume that the shirt is short-sleeved.

Despite his summery aloha shirt, the episode is canonically set during the cooler fall months so Barney layers on a chocolate-brown woolen cardigan sweater. The edges are reinforced to create a placket-like effect framing the six 2-hole buttons and their coordinating buttonholes, all of which Barney leaves undone. The sweater has set-in sleeves and squared pleated patch pockets over each hip, positioned just above the waist hem.

We may not be used to seeing Barney Fife in an aloha shirt—or anyone in an aloha shirt and a cardigan—but the former deputy’s trousers would be very familiar to viewers of The Andy Griffith Show as the bottom half of Barney’s trusty “old salt-and-pepper,” a flecked gray Donegal tweed suit that Don Knotts frequently wore not just on the series but also in some of the movies he had left the series to make, specifically The Incredible Mr. Limpet (1964), The Ghost and Mr. Chicken (1966), and The Reluctant Astronaut (1967). Knotts reportedly had several of these suits that he cycled between, including one with a Cotroneo Costume Shop label that’s on display at the Andy Griffith Museum in Mount Airy, North Carolina—Griffith’s hometown and considered to be the inspiration for the fictional Mayberry.

The suit trousers worn in “The Return of Barney Fife” have double reverse pleats and a long rise to Knotts’ natural waist, where he holds them up with a very narrow dark-brown leather belt that closes through a long rectangular gold-toned single-prong buckle. These trousers have a zip-up fly, gently slanted side pockets, and a jetted back-left pocket that closes with a single button through a short western-pointed tab.

The trouser bottoms are finished with turn-ups (cuffs), which break over the tops of Barney’s black calfskin leather split-toe derby shoes, worn with plain black socks.

Barney continues wearing his usual off-duty hat, a variation of the classic Panama hat made of a tightly woven natural straw and detailed with a maroon puggaree band. Shaped like a snap-brim fedora, the hat features a sharply creased front and diamond-shaped arrangements of ventilation holes on each side of the crown.

For the actual reunion, Barney dresses in his trademark look of a suit and bow tie, taking pride in showing Thelma Lou (Betty Lynn) his monogrammed off-white shirt, with his initials “BF” embroidered just above the breast pocket. The shirt also has a plain front and a spread collar which frames his lavender-on-purple printed straight-ended bow tie.

He unites his two-piece tweed suit by pulling on the “old salt-and-pepper” single-breasted jacket, styled with notch lapels, a three-button front, welted breast pocket, straight flapped hip pockets, two-button cuffs, and single vent.

Barney’s visit continues through the following episode, “The Legend of Barney Fife” (Episode 6.18), when Mayberry’s former deputy must demonstrate his “legendary courage” to his replacement, Warren Ferguson (Jack Burns). Despite this return to duty, Barney continues dressing for leisure by pairing “the old salt-and-pepper” suit with another aloha shirt, patterned in a brown, white, and black tribal print with floral overlays. This short-sleeved camp shirt has a loop collar, matched breast pocket, and gold shank buttons up the plain front.

The Gun

A longstanding gag of The Andy Griffith Show armed Deputy Fife with a Colt Official Police revolver, though his penchant for negligent discharges resulted in the regularly unarmed Sheriff Taylor demanding that Barney keep the revolver unloaded with only a single .38 Special round in his shirt pocket should he actually need to load it.

When Barney loads up in “The Legacy of Barney Fife” (Episode 6.18), he straps his old black basketweave leather gun belt on over his suit jacket, again armed with an Official Police in the classic service revolver configuration of a blued steel finish and four-inch barrel.

The Car

Barney cruises along Mayberry’s Main Street in his turquoise-blue 1958 Edsel Pacer convertible, evidently oblivious regarding the marque’s famously unsavory reputation as well as the actual specs.

Andy: Nice! Is that a ’61?
Barney: It’s a ’60, but it’s got a ’61 bumper.

Unfortunately, both the question and answer are erroneous as Edsel actually went defunct on November 19, 1959, nearly an entire year before the first episode of The Andy Griffith Show even premiered in October 1960. (Things may move slower in Mayberry, but surely not slow enough that they assumed Edsels were still in production eight years later.)

The Pacer was only produced for the 1958 model year, meaning that it could hardly be a ’60 (a year for which the Ranger and Villager wagon were the only Edsels still produced) and certainly not fitted with a ’61 grille as Edsels had been discontinued by this point. IMCDB discussions suggest that the dialogue may be meant to suggest that it’s merely another example of Barney pretending to know more than he does or he’s repeating fallacies relayed to him by an opportunistic Raleigh used car salesman.

The Ford Motor Company launched the Edsel marque in September 1957, but the brand met with almost instant backlash against its poor quality and unfashionable appearance to the degree that the very term “Edsel” remains synonymous with poor business decisions nearly seventy years later. The initial ’58 Edsel models consisted of the full-size Citation, Corsair, Pacer, and Ranger as well as the Bermuda, Roundup, and Villager wagons, though only the Corsair, Ranger, and Villager would survive to a second year of production.

With just under 21,000 models produced, the Pacer accounted for just over one-third of the non-wagon Edsels produced for 1958. Of these, only 1,876 were two-door convertibles like the turquoise Pacer that Barney drove into Mayberry.

Considered an upscale alternative to the Ranger, the Pacer was powered by the same 361 cubic-inch (5.9 L) Ford “FE” V8 engine that generated 303 horsepower and was mated to either a manual or optional three-speed Ford Cruise-O-Matic automatic transmission. According to an IMCDB contributor, Barney’s Edsel was rigged with the latter, controlled by both the standard column-mounted shifter as well as the “Teletouch” selector buttons mounted within the steering wheel hub—yet another highly promoted yet totally failed Edsel experiment.

How to Get the Look

Don Knotts as Barney Fife on The Andy Griffith Show (Episode 6.17: “The Return of Barney Fife”)

Do you doubt you can pull off wearing an aloha shirt with a cardigan and tweed slacks? Nip it in the bud!

Red-and-white floral pareu print short-sleeved aloha shirt with wide loop collar, plain front (with brown coconut 2-hole buttons), and non-matched breast pocket
Chocolate-brown wool 6-button cardigan sweater with set-in sleeves and squared pleated hip patch pockets
Gray Donegal tweed double reverse-pleated high-rise suit trousers with belt loops, gently slanted side pockets, jetted back-left pocket (with button-tab closure), and turn-ups/cuffs
Dark-brown narrow leather belt with long gold-toned rectangular single-prong buckle
Black calfskin leather split-toe derby shoes
Black socks
Natural straw Panama hat maroon puggaree band, snap brim, and pinched crown with diamond ventilation