Why are the pants of naval uniforms bell bottomed?
Naval undress and dress uniforms were originally buttoned because the zipper hadn’t been invented, or if it was, it wasn’t widely accepted. Also, zippers wouldn’t stand up to the salt environment of going to sea. There were originally 13 buttons on the bell bottoms for the 13 original colonies, and to my knowledge they remained until somewhere around 1975, when the uniforms changed to mimic suits.