Figure 1.-- This family snapshot photo was taken in 1944 on a Missouri farm. A boy had his photo taken on the first school day for the 1st Grade. He looks all ready to leave the farm to go to school and seems enthusiastic. He is wearing overalls, apparently a brand new pair. He also wears a short sleeved shirt anda straw hat. In his hands there are a book and his lunch pail. Click on the image to see a colorized version.

This family snapshot photo was taken in 1944 on a Missouri farm. A boy had his photo taken on the first school day for the 1st Grade. He looks all ready to leave the farm to go to school and seems enthusiastic. Some children have servastions about this huge step in their lives. He is wearing overalls, apparently a brand new pair. He also wears a short sleeved shirt anda straw hat. In his hands there are a book and his lunch pail. (The book may mean it was not the first day, but probavly very early in the school year.) Here we are at a rurning point in American education. For more thana century, children in rural areas attended small, often one room schools. At the time of World War II (1939-45) this had begun to change. School districts across the country were consolidating smll rural schools into larger schools in small towbns and bussing the children. This was primarily an econmmu measure. Small rural schools for only as few children were expdensive to operate. Another major change was school clohing. Fir serveral decades, boys in rural schools commonly wore overalls. Not all the boys, but a large proportion of them. Thus for the first time in many casesdo we see a lasrge-scale mixing ovf rural and urbn children. And the rural children saw how differently they were dressed. Not wanting to be called hicks, they began dressing like the city children.

Created: 3:14 AM 3/13/2023
Last updated: 3:14 AM 3/13/2023