Paleface

The brim of a cowboy’s hat would make an odd suntan across his face. The bottom half would be tanned dark, while the top half remained pale because it was shaded by the brim. The Native American sign for a white person was wiping the index finger across their own face along the bridge of the nose, indicating the border between dark and light skin on a cowboy’s face. They came to call the white men “pale faces”.