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We have noted pinafores being commonly worn at British primary schools during the 19th and early 20th century. Unfortunately many early images are of the whole school wih little available detail. We have some excellent school images from the early 20th century showing us the various styles of pinafores and who was wearing them at several English schools. The images show that the pinafore in England was primarily worn at schools by girls, but in the early 1900s some boys also wore them. We have no information at this time on the extent to which boys may have worn them in the 19th century.
Here we see a school in Barnstaple, North Devon, England. The image is undated, bur we believe that it was taken around the turn of the 20th century. This image looks to HBC like it might have been taken a few tears begore the turn of the century in the 1890s. Normally it is relatively easy to identify boys and girls. Other times it is much more complicated. The photo is not in as good condition as the others but is possibly the most interesting as it the one where it is the most difficult to separate the boys from the girls. Theimage shows that it was not just in small village schools where boys wore pinafores. Notice that some of the boys where much more simple than the girls' pinafores. Some of our readers have written to say that children in the English school portraits who look like boys in pinafores are not boys, but girls with short hair. While many girls wore long hair, it is certainly true that many girls did have short hair. Here I am not sure why they or their mothers decided on short hair styles. Perhaps HBC readers can provide some insights here. We do know that after World War I that short bobbed hair was a popular style, but before the War we believe that long hair was seen as much more stylish. These short hair styles do complicate the identigication of the children. And there are some children that we simply can not identify. There are, however, some children that are very clearly boys. Often but not always their pinafores are more simple than those worn by the girls. The boys, for, example, seem to often have pinafores without the shoulder frills. For example in the image here, the two children to the left and white are dfinitely girls. I am not sure about the two children in the front (bottom) row, but the child in the middle is definitely a boy. Click on the image to see even more boys.
The Knapp Road School was located at Bow, a region in the East End of London. It is in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets with a history dating back to Roman Britain. We do not have a lot of information on the school. We note records in the British National Archive (1876-1952). We think that means the school was built in 1876. This would go along with the time table of British public education . Parliament passed a public education act (1870). There was Government funding of education befofe. But Britain lagged behind many other countries, especially America and Germany. Parliament in 1870 guaranteed a free primary education for all children. Which meant a major school construction program. We have found references to a boys' school and a girls' school as well as photographs of boys and girls together. We also notice a report of a school being damaged in a World War II V--2 attack. State primaries did not have uniforms, but we notice one photograph apparently from the 1890s with boys and girls almost all wearing spotless white pinfores. We are not sure what they are wearing along with their pinafores. The class is mostly girls, but we see several children that are clearly boys. We suspect that mothers liked the idea, but we are not so sure about the boys.
Here all we have to go is a photograph which identifies a class as form VII at the Talbot Girls School. We are not sure if it is a private school or a state faith school. The form VII probably means that it was an 8 year primary and this were the next to senior class. The girls would have been about 12 years old. Catholic is not what is written on the skate, but the statue in the middle of the portrait could be nothing other than a Catholic School. Interestingly, the teacher with thm is seculr techerr, not a nun. The portrait is undated, but we would guess the late-1890s. A protective pinafores or smocks seems to have been required, but a few girls came to school with just a dark dress which also seems to have been required. We do notv see anby of the sdchool uniform garments tht becme popular in the 20th centuty. We have been unable to find any information about the school. We believe it was named Talbot because the school was in Port Talbot. Thistown is situated in southern Wales on Swansea Bay/Irish Sea, about 8 miles from the citynof Swansea. The location suggests the presence of Irish Catholic immigrants. The Port Talbot Steelworks was the major economic activity. It became one of the largest steelworks in the world before declining after World War II.
We notice numerous images from English and Scottish schools in the late 19th and early 20th century of girls wearing white or light-colored pinafores to school. We believe that this was very common. In many old images, the children are lined up in front of their school and virtually all of the girls are wearing pinnies. At this village school all of the girls exept one are wearing a pinafore over their dresses. We have even less information about boys wearing pinafores to school. The few images we have are from England and are all rural village schools. There are so few images involved that we are not sure if this was only a fashion at village schools or if pinafores were also worn in city schools. Most show pinafores and are smocks being worn by very young boys. A few images show a very small number of older boys wearing them as well. At this particular village school it looks to us that at least two boys are also wearing pinafores
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