Figure 1.--The photo was taken in Exing, a rural village in the municipality of Eichendorf, Lower Bavaria. It was prbably taken around1930. Two unidentified boys are on their way to school. The photo reveals some interesting details. The children’s clothes are very poor, as was common among farmers. Both are wearing jackets; one has long pants and the other has short pants. The clothes are heavily patched. Garments at the time were commonly were passed down from one sibling to the next. Both children have very short hair. This was a very effective measure against lice. One child is wearing wooden clogs with heavy, patched socks (winter footwear), while the other is barefoot (the common choice for summer). Perhaps the photo was taken in the fall. The children’s school sachels bags are made of wood. Cloths for erasing sltes are hanging on the outside. Inside the bags, the most important items are surely the small slates for practicing writing and arithmetic.

The photographic record suggests that the book satchels were done in leather. The satchels here are good examples (figure 1). Some of the satchels are very voluminous, box-like contructions. We think ythat some of these may be wooden contruction, with leather covering. We know that some of these book satchels were done in wood. This was not very common in the 20h century, we think it may have been more common in the 19th century. Economics was a factor here. Leather was expensive--why shoes were a relatively expensivec part of wardrobes. Leather was also a strategic material. his wa in large part because of yhe imprtance of horses and leather tackle as needeed for the horses. The Germaman Army was even dependent on horses during World War II. Thus leather book satchel begn to disappear in both World War I and II. We akso see Lederhosen disappear from ghe stores. Leather is highly durable and children who had book satchels contuinued to use them or the hand-me-down satchels of older siblings, but getting new ones became difficult. But even during peace time we see wooden book sachels. We believe this was mostly children from pooreer families, especially in rural areas.

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Created: 1:50 AM 4/22/2026
Last updated: 1:50 AM 4/22/2026