Stan, I think it had a lot to do with weight. And, for that reason---picking up on your word "men"---a reluctance to advertise the reason.

To our credit, I've noticed during the time I've been here there's been increasing comment about the smaller gauges with no apologies for using them.

It raised the notion in my head that there may have been a lot more 16-gauge going on than we thought. We just didn't want to appear effete!