Originally hats which were made from felt were produced by using animal fur, mostly beaver fur. The fur was combined with other fiber like wool by adding pressure, moisture and heat. At that time the best hats were made of beaver skin and many a time’s the men’s hats were referred as beavers. These hats had become very famous in the middle ages. But by the end of fourteenth century the cost of the beaver hats came down and was mostly produced in Low Countries.

In North America, beaver skin started being used by the hat makers of Europe in the nineteenth century. The North Americans started creating hats with second grade skins with perspiration, which made a beautiful felted products and created a huge demand in old and new world for hat making. But in the second half of the nineteenth century, the popularity of the beaver hats was overshadowed by silk hats that resembled a beaver hat. This silk was also called as beaver finished silk hats.