Chris,

I think your economic argument (i.e., evil landlords too cheap to keep buying
new canvas awnings for deadbeat tenants who left awnings exposed to
hurricanes) is probably the right one.  Besides which, there would've been
major population turnovers which would've taken the genteel awning-accustomed
out of the buildings and brought in riff raff wandering around in their
Guinea Tees instead of celluloid collars and straw boaters.  Furthermore, I
bet you'd find a major decrease in the number of canvas awning makers in/by
the late 40's early 50's. It's damn hard to find them now (one guy in
Maplewood, another in Jersey City), and as you'll no doubt remember, I
couldn't convince my fellow board members of our local arboretum (in the 1889
Babb, Cook & Willard house) to put them up to cool the sunporch.  Too much
trouble, they said, we'll put up mylar.  Since then, there've been God knows
how many birds flying into the mirrored glass.    Oh, yes, much better than
awnings.

Ralph