Individual American Schools: Lancaster School (early-1880s)


Figure 1.--Here we have a school portrait without any identufying information. It is a kind of cabinet card, but there is no studio imprint or writing on the back. The clothing I think fairly certainly suggests that this class portrait was taken in the 1870s or 80s. We say that because many of the boys are wearing long knee pants or even long trousers. CDVs were more common in the 60s and knee-length knee pants in the 90s. Also we do not see any Fauntleroy-like collars or bows. The boys seem to have small collars and mostly suit jackets with high lapels. Thus the early-80s seems most likely.

This cabinet card portrait shows an unidentified group of boys and girls about 10-11 years old. All we know for sure is that the portrait was taken in or near Lancaster, New Hampshire. We do not know the name of the school, but suspect it was called the Lancaster School. We suspect that it was taken in the town. It looks like a school group, probably a clss group. They are probably standing in front of their school. but ee think the older children in the school. Perhaps not the oldest children as we suppect tht the school went up to the 8th grade which would be children 13-14 years of age. Such a large class group suggests a town rather than a rural school. There are about 35 children, the girls out number the boys two to one. This suggests many boys dropped out before reaching the upper grades. We suspect that they dressed up for the occasion because they were told the photgrapher was coming. The boys wear suits, but we do not see ties. Most of the jackets are collar, buttoning styles. One boy has a crisp Eton collar The boys wear hats not caps. We see amix of knee pants and long pants. There is no hint of Fauntleroy styling which suggests the early-80s. The boys are too old for actual Fauntleroy suits, but boys this age during the Fauntleroy era beginning in 1885 did often wear Fauntleroy items like ruffled collars and floppy bows. The girls seem more fashionanly dressed than the boys. The girls all look to be wearing their best dresses. There are no pinafores. And we do not see any hairbows.







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Created: 11:43 AM 11/12/2016
Last updated: 11:43 AM 11/12/2016