Artifact ID: Donovian Rainmen

The ‘Donovian Rainmen’ are a pretty deep cut, never appearing (as far as I know) on-screen in their film, but only in a DK reference book, a behind-the-scenes documentary (“A Twinkle Beyond Pluto”) on the Episode II DVD, and one frame of Dark Horse’s Republic #80.

However, they have always intrigued me, given their specific ‘occupational’ identity. The grand total of what we know about them can be summed up in a sentence or two, and indeed this is the case of their Wookieepedia page:
“A rainman was any technician who tended the signal towers above the rainy world Donovia. Easily recognized by their absurd rain hoods, the efforts of the rainmen kept the mining traffic to and from Donovia moving smoothly.”

The thing that especially interests me for our purposes here is that much of their gear seems to be unmodified military surplus items, which not only means that such pieces are acceptable for in-universe use, but are also relatively easy to purchase here on Earth.

In yellow and pink I have highlighted the items that we can fairly conclusively identify:

Belts: The rainman on the left wears wears a USGI pre-M1967 (M1956 or M1936—cotton) pistol belt (with the old-style wire fastening); the two on the right wear an LC-2 nylon pistol belt with ‘duckbill’ buckle:

Hanging on the middle rainman’s belt, we see a European milsurp winter hat—possibly Swedish?

Footwear: the two rainmen on the left wear what appear to be Swiss snow gaiters!:

Each of these items are readily available from military surplus shops for less than $20 USD. While they may be familiar to the knowledgeable and sharp-eyed viewer, when paired with the rest of the ensemble, they blend into the background and help to suggest the kind of used, military-influenced aesthetic that makes this setting so much fun to explore.

As for the clothing under their hoods, each of the three rainmen appears to be wearing the same style of jacket, in different colors (two in purpley-brown, and the center in rusty red). It seems to be a nylon rainjacket (appropriate!), with a half zipper and three flapped pouch pockets on the front: one on either side of the front closure and one on the stomach. At first I thought that perhaps these were off-the-shelf, unmodified garments, but after being unable to find anything with this particular arrangement, and getting a better view in the behind-the-scenes documentary, I have revised my thinking.

From this clearer view of the front pockets, we also get a better look at the curious ‘V’ shaped flap on the front of the jacket (this ‘V’ is clearly visible in the original image on the center and right rainmen). Based on this screencap, it seems clear that the stripes of the ‘V’ aren’t simply decoration applied to the edges of the flap, but are actually sewn tubes, much like those used in modern dome tents. In fact, if you look at the rainman’s costume and think about tents, it should become clear that this is what he is essentially wearing—the centermost ‘rib’ of his hood comes down to waist level and is held in place by the flap on the front of his jacket. (I have attempted to illustrate this using the left rainman above).

With this in mind, I believe the rainmen’s garments were originally off-the-shelf rain jackets. However, I think that to accommodate the hood’s central rib, a V-shaped flap of the same material (with sewn tubes on the edges) was applied directly under the upper pockets, covering the lower half of the center zipper with the large ‘belly pocket’.

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