Figure 1.--Here we see the boys and girls at an uinidentified one-room school in Michigan. There were nione children. You can see their school in the background. The snap shot is undated, but was probably taken in the 1910s. Several children wear sweaters. Bangs were common as a hair style.

We know little about rural schools in the early-19th century before th invention of photoptgraphy. Even after the invention of photgraphy, images are quite limited for the mid- and late-19th century. We have, however, quite a number of images from the early-20th century which give us a look at these schools before they began to disappear after World War II. The images not only provide information about rural schools, but about fashion trends in rural areas. Children in these schools did not wear uniforms. Fashion trends can thus be assessed by looking at what the children were wearing to school. Unfortunately many of the available images are not identified or dated. The fashions, however, help us estimate the dates. Some but not all show the school building in the background. More rare are photographs taken inside the schools.

Rural School (1911)

Boys at this rural school sailor suits, various shirts, and Fauntleroy blouses. Presumably the children dressed up a bit to have their photographs taken.

Rural School (about 1915)

This school group looks to have been photographed about 1915. It is an unidentified image, but I would say was probably taken in a small town in a rural area. It looks like some of the children are Indian. Perhaps the school might be be in North Dakota. The children do not seemed to have dressed up for the photograph.

Unidentified Michigan Schools (1910s)

Here we see the boys and girls at an uinidentified one-room school in Michigan (figure 1). There were nione children. You can see their school in the background. The snap shot is undated, but was probably taken in the 1910s. Several children wear sweaters. Bangs were common as a hair style.

Deckard Primary School (1930s)

Deckard Primary School was located in Brown County, Indiana. This is located in the southern part of the state, an essentially rural area. We have a photograph from 1934-35. The teacher standing in the rear is Clotha Hillenburg. This looks like a typical small one-room rural school. As a result of the Land Ordinance of 1785 every block of public land had one section (number 16) reserved for public schools. This was used to both locate the school and sold to finance the schools. Thus there were large numbers of small rural schools in America until after World War II when they were consolidated. Most of the boys here, who are about look to be about 6-12 years old, wear overalls to school. This was quite common in rural America until after World War II. One boy in the second row on the extreme right wears short trousers with long cotton beige stockings (obviously with supporters), a short-sleeved white shirt, and a somewhat oversized sweater-vest. Long stockings were still woirn in the 1930s, esoecially in th early 30s, but becoming less common. I doubt if the long stockings are being worn for warmth. They are a very lightweight version. Long stockings were just one of the several appropriate options for young schoolboys in the 1930s. The children are standing in front of their smallish rural school building. Overalls were very common school wear in the midst of the Great Depression. Notice that boys greatly outnumber the girls. I am not sure why that was, perhaps just a statistical accident gicen the small number of children.

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Created: 5:19 AM 7/22/2008
Last updated: 5:19 AM 7/22/2008