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U.S. school clothes -- chronology: United States 1910s major change
U.S. School Clothes: The 1910s--Major Change
Figure 1.--This glass plate negative (rather unusual at the time) shows a clapboard rural school with about 35 children. We have no idea where it was located, probably the Midwest. It look like a plain, but very well-constucted school, but with a rough front step where the children are standing. The boys are all wearing suit,s exceot for the youngest , one of which is wearing a tunic suit and another a wide collared blouse. the photograph is of interest because itwas taken at the timne that the transtion from knee pants to knickers occurred. it also shows that in rural areas some boys wore long pants, muvh less common in urban areas. Notice that the teacher wears a blouse and skirt, but the girls are all wearing dresses, most with hair bows. They all wear blck long stockings. We believe the photograoh was taken about 1910. School began with 1st grade at about age 6 years. Some teachers allowed well behaved younger siblings to attend which seems to be the case here. click ob the image for a wider view iof the school. Ynfiortunately it does not how much of the setting ecept that it was a rural area.
A major and rather sudden change in boyswear occurred about 1908-10. We do not know why such a sudden change occurred. American boys who for several decades had been wearing straight-leg knee pants suddenly shifted to knickers. We begin to see this in 1908 and even more so 1909, and it was largely an established standard by 1910, at least in the cities. The shift took a little longer in rural areas where some boys still wore long pants. This can clearly be seen in the photogrphic record. Knee pants were standard boys wear in the 1900s, but knickers were standard in the 10s. Knickers were not as common in rural areas as they were in urban areas. Many of the boys wearing long pants are seen in rural areas and fiorv the first time we begin to commonly see boys wearuing overalls. We see these chamges taking place in the school photograophy as chikldren wire thaeir regular clothes to school. And the school ophotography involved large numbers of children and quite a bumber of images are dated. .
