Figure 1.--These English children were probablu photographed in the 1890s. Both appear to be wearing dresses and very similar pinafores. The child on the left is definitely a boy. Note his short hair hair. The yonger child has a dool while the older boy a jump rope. Note the wooden handles. |
We notice that some mothers used the pinafore in much thesame way as a smock. They would dress all their younhfer children in pennies to protect their clothing. This included brothers and brothers, sisters and sisters, and brothers and sisters. Normaly this might mean sisters and younger brothers. Here we note, however, also older brothers and younger sisters wearing identical or similar pennies. Once a boy eached a certain age he would no longer wear pennies. This conventon varied from family to family. There were changes here both over time and among countries. We do not at this time have adequate information to persue these variables, but hope to do so as HBC develops. Some mothers may have varied the pinnafores for boys and girls, but we do not yet have sufficent information to assess these. Clearly some mothers did not. We believe that pinafores were much more common than the hostorical image shows. This was partly because the pinny was an informal garment worn at home to protect clothing and for portraits children were dressed in their best clothes.
We are not sure why this English mother kept her children in their pennies for the portrait (figure 1). Perhaps because they were such beautiful pennies with intricate lace. The image seen here is English. The photographer was G.J. Jones, but the city is difficult to make out. It looks to be Surbiton a suburb of South West London. The child on the left is definitely a boy. Note his short hair hair. The yonger child has a dool while the older boy a jump rope, called a skipping rope in England. Note the wooden handles.
Note the album marks. Family portraits used to be stored in albums which would be brought out for visitors. Damage like this is caused by the photograph being rubbed by the facing page of the album it was once in.
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