Figure 1.-- Here we see the second year class at the Merschwitz town school in 1932. The children would have been about 7-8 years old. Many of the boys are barefoot. The girls seem to wear shoes. We see barefoot children after World war I, but by the 1930s was less common. Most of the boys wear shirts with suspenders or haltars. The girls mostly wear dresses. One girl wears a skirt.

We note the Merschwitz near Meißen, in Saxony. We do not yet know much about Merschwitz. The substantial school suggests it was more of a town than a village. It appears to have been a fairly standard primary school in a substantial building. We are not sure when it was built, but we would guess the 1920s. There surely was a school in town before this building was built. The images we have are from the 1930s. We have both a 2nd grade (1932) and a 5th grade (1935) class. We see both boys and girls. Villages and small towns generally had coeducatiional schools. Larger towns which had more than a single school were more likely to have single-gender schools. The classes include anout 30 children each.

Merschwitz

We note the Merschwitz near Meißen, in Saxony. We do not yet know much about Merschwitz.

The School

The substantial school suggests it was more of a town than a village. It appears to have been a fairly standard primary school in a substantial building. We are not sure when it was built, but we would guess the 1920s. There surely was a school in town before this building was built.

The 1930s

The images we have are from the 1930s. We have both a 2nd year (1932) and a 5th grade (1935) class. We see both boys and girls. Villages and small towns generally had coeducatiional schools. Larger towns which had more than a single school were more likely to have single-gender schools. The classes include anout 30 children each.

1932: 2nd year

Here we see the 2nd year class at the Merschwitz town school in 1932. The children would have been about 7-8 years old. Many of the boys are barefoot. The girls seem to wear shoes. We see barefoot children after World war I, but by the 1930s was less common. Most of the boys wear shirts with suspenders or haltars and longish-cut short pants. One boy wears a jacket. Scoolwear was affected by age. Younger children were allowed to dress more infomally. The girls mostly wear dresses. One girl wears a skirt.

1935: 5th year

We see the children 3 years later. Many are presumably the same children, now in their 5th year. A good deal has changed in those short 3 years. The most significant is that the NAZIs seized power (1933). And we see many of the children, both boys and girls, wearing their Hitler Youth uniforms to school. Second year students would not be HJ members. The chikdren joined at 10byears of age which would have been in the 4th year. The number of HJ members is interesting, especially as member ship did not begin to become compulsory when a new law became effective (1937). One would suspect that the decesion to join the HJ and wear the uniform might in part reflectv the political orientation of the parents. We do not know if the children normallwore their uniforms. Most school portaits, even after 1937, do not show most of the children wearing their HJ uniforms. Nor do we kmow if the school played a role in this. There may have been specials days in whivch the children wore their uniforms. Footvwear is varied. Sedveral bpoys are barefoot, but not a many as the younger children in 1932.

Barefeet

A reader writes, "I don't think that bare feet are only a matter of poverty for German children. It is evident that poor children went barefoot more than children of middle class, and also that children living in rural areas more than children living in towns. However it seems to me that German people don't associate bare feet with poverty." This is an interesting question. We do note that images of barefoot German children are most strongly associated with the two post-war German periods after World War I and II. These were eras of extreme poverty and scarcity of consumer goods. (Leather was a critical material in both wars.) And as our reader mentions, going barefoot was more common in rural areas. But the 1930s school images here were well after World War I. And although 1935 was the Depression era in America, Germany by 1935 was coming out of the Depression. We are not entirely sure why so many of the boys here are barefoot. As our reader mentions, there may be other factors involved.

Navigate the German school pages
[Return to the Main alphabetical individual German school uniform page]
[Return to the Main 1930s individual German school uniform page]
[Return to the Main individual German school uniform page]
[Return to the Main school uniform national page]
[Return to the Main German school uniform page]
[Imperial Germany] [Weimar Republic] [NAZI era] [Post-war Years] [Modern Germany]

Navigate the Relate Boys Historical Clothing Style Pages
[Reyrurn to the Main German barefoot page]
[Long pants suits] [Short pants suits] [Lederhosen] [Kneesocks] [Eton suits]
[Jacket and trousers] [Blazer [School sandals]

Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing School Uniform Pages
[Main School Uniform Page]
[Austria] [Czechoskovakia] [England] [France] [Germany] [Italy] [Japan]
[New Zealand] [Poland] [Scotland] [United States]

Navigate the Boys' Historical Clothing Web Page
[Introduction] [Activities] [Biographies] [Chronology] [Cloth and textiles] [Clothing styles] [Countries] [Topics]
[Bibliographies] [Contributions] [FAQs] [Glossaries] [Images] [Links] [Registration] [Tools]
[Boys' Clothing Home]

Created: 12:39 AM 10/20/2009
Last updated: 8:18 PM 8/14/2010