A Nation of Hobbyists, Logos on Our Backs, Etc.

The word “hobby” has an old-fashioned ring to it, calling to mind images of elderly relatives knitting and playing cribbage. Nonetheless, polls by Gallup indicate Americans are more likely to be hobbyists now than they were half a century ago. Asked whether there’s any hobby in which they’re “particularly interested,” just 19 percent of a new poll’s respondents answered “none.” By contrast, 42 percent of respondents to a 1948 Gallup survey described themselves as hobbyless.