So how tall was St. Louis? And who was wearing his shirt?

I got an interesting mini research question in e-mail this week, via my article Another Look at St. Louis' Shirt. The questioner asked, "Is there any way St. Louis' height could be approximated [from the garment], or does the design of the garment give nothing away?" And, as usual, I got sucked into the joy of rolling around in the data for a while and ended up with some interesting analysis but very few clear conclusions. The following includes a whole bunch of data and discussions that I hadn't included in my original answer (including more comparative material and the differences between Burnham's estimate of the garment's dimensions and my own estimates).

ETA: I've added a little more data regarding the relationship of sleeve length to shoulder width.

So here's a somewhat stream-of-consciousness presentation of how I sit down to analyze a question of this type.

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