They were usually the leads. The leads didn’t need to wear hats indoors if they were other professions.
Being bald, I wear a hat whenever I go out in the sun and I don’t always think to remove it in public places, even indoor public places. One day, I happened to have my hat on while visiting the cathedral in Strassbourg. I was being a tourist, not a worshiper and mainly interested in the clock, but one young man got extremely upset at this and started screaming at me (in French).
At other public places in Europe, no one has ever said anything, but that doesn’t show they weren’t unhappy.
Some years ago, I went to a funeral service in a Catholic church. Most funerals I have been to have been in synagogues and I actually felt just a bit naked by not having my head covered.
This is really one of those recreational outrage things.
Back in the days when everyone wore hats, it was only considered impolite to wear a hat indoors in formal environments, like church. I’m quite the fan of old photos, and there are plenty of photos from before 1960 or so that show that working-class people generally wore hats while working, indoors or out. Look up some old photos of factory workers; most of them have caps on, or bowlers, or whatever was the usual form of headgear at the time.
Look up photos of people in bars, pubs, diners, etc: MANY of them are wearing their hats indoors. You were expected to remove your hat in a formal (ie “classy”) environment, which would have hat check facilities, but in an informal environment you kept your hat on unless you felt like taking it off, and no one freaked out about it.
People that freak out about it nowadays are people that are looking for something to freak out about. It’s a way of making themselves feel superior to the “trashy” people who don’t know the supposed rules of politeness. And it’s utter bullshit: there never was such a rule except in certain formal environments.
I think it is specifically a US military thing that “hats are never worn indoors” because the people that seem to be most convinced that there was/is such a rule that applies to civilians seem to often be ex-US-military. I haven’t noticed that attitude from UK/Commonwealth people, but there are nutters (and people who imagine themselves “superior” to the “impolite” common folk) in every culture.
…and my cite is Google Image search; you know how to use it.
Here in England, a gentleman removes his hat upon entering a building.
The only exceptions are Kings (crowns OK), Archbishops (mitre OK) and Dr. Who (fez OK.) 
There seems to be an implied no-hats-indoors taboo in Roald Dahl’s Matilda (set in 1980s[?] England) when Mr. Wormwood has to go to work with his hat superglued to his head:
Yeah in Prague in December when it was about 28 degrees outside and about 25 in St. Vitus’ Cathedral (we were there in a warm snap), this angry Czech guy came up and gesticulated at me to take off my watch cap while in the cathedral.
I haven’t heard of churches requiring head covering for women, but they often do require shoulders and knees on women to be covered.
I initially read this as “a cowboy hat over a fez.” I can see how it would be cumbersome to take that arrangement off and on.
I own a military fez.
My father bought it for me, when I was a boy, from a military surplus shop; it has a WD (British War Department) stamp inside it. I do not know for what military purpose it was originally made, or where it is acceptable to wear it, however.
Yeah, it’s a Christian church thing that got absorbed into general cultural etiquette.
Amusing observation: several years back, I read about the local Elks club voting to change their rules about men sitting at the bar at the club. They’d had an age-old rule that men had to remove their hats while in the Elk’s bar. But, like most longstanding service clubs, they had been experiencing a dramatic drop in membership. The old members were dying off, and younger people weren’t joining to replace them. So they had observed that “younger people” liked to wear their baseball caps everywhere, indoors and outdoors. They decided that the “no hats indoors” rule was old-fashioned, and voted it out.
And they had a point, and I credit them with noticing. There’s too much wrapped up in “tradition”. My last job hosted the weekly Lion’s Club luncheon, and it was rare to see people my own age (40s) attending these luncheons. I watched these luncheons, and observed that the attendees’ idea of entertainment seemed to revolve around “singalongs”. A popular form of entertainment … way before I was born. “Youngsters” like me (did I mention I’m nearly 50?) aren’t into “singalongs”. You’re not going to attract new, young members by having singalongs. Or making the boys take off their baseball caps. Seriously, you get some young kid who actually wants to help his fellow man, and you tell him he can’t help his fellow man unless he takes his hat off?
Yes, the traditional British working class flat cap, as worn by Andy Capp, certainly used be kept on, in the pub, at any rate. However, I am not sure that anyone really wears them at all any more (except “ironically”).
According to this story, some British pubs these days will refuse you service if you are wearing a flat cap.
As you imply, there was a strong class aspect to this, and ‘gentlemen’ would probably not keep their hats on in the saloon bar (and their hats would not be flat caps anyway).
It’s probably quite old, in that case - the War Department’s name changed to the War Office in 1857 or thereabouts and the WD marking appears to have been discontinued around 1895 or thereabouts.
As to wear Fezzes where used in the British military: IIRC the West India Regiment (as in the Caribbean, not the western part of India) wore Fezzes as part of their uniform, and I believe the Fez formed a semi-official part of British undress uniforms in places like Egypt and the Sudan around the 1880s-c.1930s.
General Charles “Chinese” Gordon was known to wear a Fez, for what it’s worth. It wouldn’t surprise me to discover they were worn by late Victorian or Edwardian British military personnel in places like Aden or even India, however.
The same thing happened to me when visiting Ireland. I also try to protect my shiny pate from the sun and frequently forget that I’m even wearing a hat. When looking around in one of their cathedrals, I was harshly reprimanded by a priest who seemed quite angry about it.
I think you are mistaken about the marking being discontinued, both the letters WD and the broad arrow symbol used with them seem to have continued to be used long after the demise of the Board of Ordnance (which introduced the Broad Arrow) and even after the War Department became the Department of Defence (at least if Wikipedia is reliable). I think my father, who had served in WWII told me that the broad arrow and WD represented War Department.
Anyway, my fez has several markings, in some sort of yellow paint, inside it:
H & P (I am guessing the manufacturer’s mark)
6¾ (presumably the size)
1950 (Presumably the date of manufacture. The fez would have been bought for me from the surplus shop some time in the late 1950s or very early 1960s)
Then to one side there is the broad arrow symbol, with the letters W and D on either side of it. Also above it there is a T, and below it the number 63. I have no idea what those might mean.
There is also another, larger broad arrow symbol, pointing in the opposite direction, on the other side of where the tassel attaches on the inside of the fez.
What you say about the West India Regiment I interesting. Perhaps it was made for one of their uniforms. (Why people from the West Indies should have been uniformed with fezzes is beyond me, but not necessarily beyond military logic, I guess.) However, Wikipedia also tells me that fezzes were part of the uniform of the King’s African Rifles and the Royal West African Frontier Force, both of which appear to have been disbanded around the time of decolonialization, which explains why there may have been surplus fezzes being sold off some time around 1960.
I have seen pictures of General Gordon in his fez, but I assumed that it was a personal affectation and a personal possession, rather than an official part of his uniform, supplied by the War Department. Gordon’s fez also seems to have been more conical than mine, which is almost cylindrical in shape,and made of fairly rigid dark red felt.
Also in someone’s home, which is not necessarily formal. Also in an elevator if a lady was present, don’t ask me why.
The meme of “I’m being oppressed because someone asked me to remove my hat” is also recreational outrage.
My dad grew up in cowboy country, in an era when the state had more horses than automobiles. The rule among all of his relatives was, “A gentleman always removes his hat indoors, or in the presence of a lady.” Through most of this country’s history, people expected that their children would be wealthier than their parents. So many of them tried to teach their children middle-class manners. It was only in the 1960s that people started sneering at the middle class.
The fez was the base around which one wrapped one’s turban. So they were manufactured in vast quantities for the Indian and African regiments. General Gordon wore one because, technically, he was serving as a mercenary for the Egyptian government.
Cite? I am not saying a turban has never been wound around a fez, but I do not believe most turbans have fezzes under them, and fezzes are commonly worn without turbans, and were so worn by the African military regiments (or whatever they count as) that I mentioned, as a quick Google image search will reveal. There a re a lot of fezzes to be seen there. I do not see any turbans.
A special case: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JiP1z9qfojA
My co-worker wears a baseball hat to the office on casual Fridays sometimes. I find it vaguely distressing that he does so, not enough to tell him to take it off or do anything about it, but just enough to think him a bit loutish for wearing it in the office. Plus it’s not a very flattering hat for him.
I’m not seeing anyone claiming to be oppressed.