Anticipating a large turnout, I arrived early this past Easter Sunday for the 7:30 AM Mass at St. John Neumann Catholic Church in Reston, Virginia.  While "batting the breeze" with the ushers standing in the vestibule, I noted that the female parishioners passing us to enter the sanctuary were not wearing Easter bonnets – an observation of the congregation that remained unchanged from my later limited-view pew position.

On exiting the church after Mass, an usher with an expanded view from his position in the rear of the sanctuary said that neither had he seen a single Easter bonnet in the overflow crowd attending that morning. 

Later, during brunch at J. Gilbert's restaurant in McLean, I recalled how, at one time, the Easter bonnet was a popular fashion statement for ladies to welcome the spring season and celebrate the day.  Hollywood captured that popularity in the 1948 movie and song Easter Parade.  The movie's theme song even won the Academy Award that year for Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture: 

In your Easter bonnet, with all the frills upon it,
You'll be the grandest lady in the Easter Parade.
I'll be all in clover and when they look you over,
I'll be the proudest fellow in the Easter Parade.
On the avenue, Fifth Avenue, the photographers will snap us,
And you'll find that you're in the rotogravure.
Oh, I could write a sonnet about your Easter bonnet,
And of the girl I'm taking to the Easter Parade.

During my last cup of brunch coffee, I lamented the bonnet's disappearance and wondered what had caused the demise of this tradition.  That curiosity prompted me to stop at the reception desk on leaving the restaurant and ask a young lady there why women had stopped wearing Easter bonnets.  She answered, "What's an Easter bonnet?"