CSU Archives/Courtesy Everett Collection

What do bartenders, policemen and servicemen have in common, aside from a general shared fondness for the restorative powers of a good drink? Would you believe shirt garters? What’s that?

It’s a love/hate thing, an under-the-bar secret that men (and possibly some women, though I haven’t found any yet) pass along. It’s what your natty bartender has on under his pants, for lack of a better way to put it. The shirt garter is exactly that: a $7 rubberized strap with garter hooks on both ends that attach the tails of your shirt to the tops of your socks, keeping your shirt neatly tucked in while, as a symbiotic windfall, holding up your socks.

There are three basic types: straight bands, which you wear four of; Y-bands, which you wear two of; or Y-bands with stirrup loops that go under your heels rather than attaching to your socks. They work brilliantly, but they can be all kinds of aggravating. They itch, particularly if you incorrectly have the metal part of the hitch against your skin, and they can unexpectedly come undone, with some wearers — particularly on military Web sites — citing harrowing examples of being snapped. They are, in fact, a borrowed staple of both police and military uniform maintenance, which, given all the bending, stretching and hustling one does in a 12-hour shift behind the bar, makes perfect sense. If you’re going to bring back the olde-timey barkeep look, you have to bring the accouterments as well. Tie clips, pinkie rings and double-breasted waistcoats are all well and good, but when your shirt is flapping out like a surrender flag, your whole game is dead.

Hence the look-both-ways, sotto voce tip, “Dude, shirt garters,” that seems to have traveled the entire bartending community, illuminating the uninitiated about these peculiar, quasi-burlesque necessities. I discovered them only this year, from Brian Miller, the veteran of Death & Company and Pegu Club, who said of their resuscitation, “When I first heard of them, I had to call my dad and ask what they were. When I first started wearing them, all the young guys — Don Lee and John Deragon from PDT — were making fun of me. Now everyone’s got them on.”

Locating them can be a bit of a task. New Yorkers are accustomed to thinking that anything in the haberdashery line can be fished from Midtown’s venerable firms, but knock yourself out. Miller told me the only place he’s found them reliably is online from Muldoon’s, an estimable 60-year-old, family-run men’s-wear shop in Eau Claire, Wis.

Both Miller and Jim Meehan, who helms PDT, said they first heard of them from Toby Maloney, the engaging lifer who now runs Alchemy Consulting and who has been the force behind numerous famous watering holes, including the Violet Hour in Chicago and the Rusty Knot here. Maloney said he discovered them while working with Joseph Swartz early on in the run of Milk & Honey, Sasha Petraske’s justly famous first bar, in the early aughts. His take on them was that of a man all too well acquainted with their pros and cons.

“Oh, the shirt garters,” he said. “I live in mine. I introduce them to all the bartenders. To explain how necessary I think they are, I will laugh and point at the shirt pooch that forms between the waist of the pants and the bottom of the vest of the guys who don’t wear them. I also tell them that after using them a while, they become so adept at the fasteners that they can unhook garter belts with one hand.

“My head guy down at the Patterson House in Nashville, Josh Habiger, said the only thing worse than wearing shirt garters is not wearing them, and I feel that sums the situation up perfectly. They are fussy and annoying. They detach and leak out your pant leg at the most inopportune time. If ratcheted too tight, you feel like a dandy Pinocchio, slightly drunk and walking on the moon. Worst of all, they get you singled out in security lines at the airport. To this day there hasn’t been a T.S.A. employee who hasn’t raised an eyebrow when I explain about the shirt garters, ‘No, really, the armed forces wear them to look shipshape, and they keep your socks up while at the same time keeping your shirt from pooching below your vest.’ Maybe if I quit using the word ‘pooch.’ And ‘shipshape.’ ”

Eric Alperin, a part-owner of the Varnish in Los Angeles and another alumnus of Milk & Honey who discovered them there as well, takes a stauncher view of their necessity. “Sasha first introduced us to them, and I thought, Hmm, really? They felt weird at first, but you get used to them. Now I wear the stirrup type that loops around your foot. Marcos Tello, a bartender at the Varnish, his cousin is a cop, and he picks them up for us all at a police-supply place somewhere. They have a purpose, a working function. On a Saturday night, blasting out 200 cocktails, it’s a comfort to not look like a slob when you’re running hard — none of that muffin top between your pants and vest. It’s a part of pulling on your armor; they make you feel like a superhero.”

Seven bucks and some aggravation to feel like a superhero? Sold. Just don’t let your girl see you getting these on; it could be hard to live down.