What’s in a hat? By any other name, it would still look just as cool. 

For the Arizona Capitol Times this week, we decided to have a bit of fun during a tense and spicy legislative session. We asked four senators about their hats, either the ones in their official Senate photos or the ones they wear most often. 

Arizona is the American Southwest and there’s no shortage of Western history and culture. It has spilled over into the Legislature and seeing anyone donning a cowboy hat on any given day is not uncommon. Here are the stories under the hats. 

PS: Sens. T.J. Shope, David Gowan and Mark Finchem, happy to chat about your hats too! Just throw your hat in our ring.

Sen. Janae Shamp

Shamp’s blue-roan hat is only available from JW Brooks Custom Hats in Lipan, Texas (about an hour west of Fort Worth). A friend told her about it and she went out of her way to find it. It’s not custom made, but shaped in the classic cowboy cut, she said. Her husband buys her hats and for Shamp, that just adds an extra sense of love. 

It’s not just a shtick either, she said. She grew up riding horses and doing hunter-jumper events, a type of show jumping. Then she married her husband, a farmer and rancher who had roped all his life, and she switched to team roping. She sported a silver buckle won at an event in Montana. 

“It’s a way of life for us,” she said. “I like to have a sharp hat because cowboys take a lot of pride in their hats.”

Do you have a hard and fast rule about when you wear your hat to the Senate?

I always wear my hat. I’m not allowed to wear it on the floor or in committee, even though women are usually allowed to wear a hat anywhere they go. I always take it off when I come inside. You take it off when you shake hands, although a girl doesn’t have to. You take it off when the National Anthem is played or the Pledge of Allegiance, but as a girl, you don’t have to. I would never wear it in church. That’d be completely inappropriate.

Have you ever lost your hat – either couldn’t find it or blew off in the wind?

They come off in the wind, especially for me. I don’t team rope in my cowboy hat. When I rope my steer and I dally and I turn left and I’m looking back, the wind will get underneath and flip my cowboy hat off and it’ll head right for the heel horse’s face and then they spook. When I team rope, I wear a ball cap. 

How do you know when a cowboy hat is earned?

You know, in our world, I don’t think anybody ever says that you have to earn the right to wear a cowboy hat. People who generally wear cowboy hats live under a certain kind of set of rules in life. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone judged for wearing a hat.

Sen. TJ Shope, I gave him a hard time once. I’m like, “How are you a cowboy?” And he’s like, “I have cows. They’re just packaged in the grocery store.” I’m like, “Good point.”

It’s a culture, and it’s a very accepting culture. 

Has anyone ever called you out for wearing it?

People like to insult me on social media all the time, “Take off the stupid hat. You look dumb. It’s just a shtick.” No, it’s not. 

Which senator should wear a hat who does not currently wear one?

Sen. Flavio Bravo