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Information
Besides
their unusual looks and their inability to fly, ostriches
achieved fame in 1870 when the "great feather boom"
took the world by storm. Suddenly it was fashionable
for ladies to be seen with a feather boa or an item
of clothing made from feathers. It is estimated that
at the height of the feather boom the town in the Little
Karoo, Oudtshoorn (also called the ostrich feather capital
of the world) exported 450 000 kilograms of ostrich
feathers per year. Fashion is fickle as we all know,
and the 20th century saw the destructiveness of two
world wars and this all but destroyed the feather industry
as fashions became more austere and less glamorous.
There is still a demand for ostrich feathers and leather
today, but it's on a much smaller scale.
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