Figure 1.--This undated image shows a German primary school class which we believe was photographed about 1905. As was often the case, the teacher was a man. Note the variety of different sailor suits. Image courtesy of the MD collection.
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Figure 1.--This undated image shows a German primary school class which we believe was photographed about 1905. As was often the case, the teacher was a man. Note the variety of different sailor suits. Image courtesy of the MD collection. |
We estimate that this undated German primary class photograph was taken about 1905, although this is only an estimate. There are no identifying marks on the photograph. There are no identifying marks on the photograph. The look of the boys, their clothes, and their hair styles strongly suggest that it was German. The absence of lederhosen suggest that it may have been a school in northern Germany. The teacher appaers to be 35-40 years of age, clearly a caeer teacher. There were women teachers, especially in promary school, but most teachers in boys' schools or for boys' classes were men--even for the younger primary grades. The absence of lederhosen suggest that it may have been a school in northern Germany. It is a high quality image allowing us to examine the boy's outfits in considerable detail. Sailor suits were very popular and came in a great variety of styles. None of the boys wear lederhosen nor any boys barefoot--both telling up somehing about the school and the chidren. Some of the boys have metal studs in the soles of their shoes to make them last longer.
This class photograph unfortunately was undated. We think the number of boys with shaved heads and sailor suits suggest that it was a pre-World War I (1914-18) image. Given the style of the teachers suit and tie, we think it was probably fairly close to the turn of the century, perhaps about 1905. This is, however, only a roufg guess. Hopefully our German readers will help date it with more precission.
There are no identifying marks on the photograph. The look of the boys, their clothes, and their hair styles strongly suggest that it was German. The absence of lederhosen suggest that it may have been a school in northern Germany.
This photograph was not a postcard image. It is larger than a postcard, about 7" x 5" and has been trimmed down. So it orginally had a border on it which no doubt would have revealed the photographers name and location etc.
Figure 2.--The boy on the left wears a traditionally styled sailor suit, but the note the wide range of other outfits that have sailor styling of some kind. Note the boy on the right. Is he wearing corduroy or stripped kneepants. Image courtesy of the MD collection. |
These boys look to be about 7 or 8 years old. There are 51 boys in this photograph. This seems a very large group of children, especilly at this age when boys are just mastering their reading skills. We wonder how the teacjer managed to reach such a large group. He must have been a very strict disiplinarian. Certainly there would not have been much time to give the boys much individual attention.
This was an all boy school, or at least an all boys class. We are unsure if primary schools were single gender or if the classes were just divided within the schools. We have seen some photographs of mixed classes. This probably varied somewhat among the German states. Also it is likely that small rural schools were mixed while urban states were more likely to be single gender schools. This was a city or town school. The school building can be seen in the background and its seems a substantial building.
The teacher appaers to be 35-40 years of age, clearly a caeer teacher. There were women teachers, especially in promary school, but most teachers in boys' schools or for boys' classes were men--even for the younger primary grades.
Many of the boys in this wore sailor suits or outfits with sailor styling of some kind like the square neck blouse. None of the boys wore lederhosen. There were also a variety of other outfits worn by the boys.
There is no idea as to what kind of hats and caps the boys wore. We suspect that there were a lot of sailor caps.
Many of the boys in this class wear sailor suits or a variety of outfits with a wide range of sailor styling. Several boys wear stand sailor suits with classic styling, but even more wear non-traditional sailor styling or other garments with sailor influences. There are both dark and light suits so we are unsure about the season. All the boys wear kneepants with their sailor suits or middy blouses.
Figure 3.--This image shows the wide range of outfits worn by the boys in the class. Note the one boy with the white Peter Pan collar. Other boys had white collars, this boy was the one with a white Perter Pan collar. The two boys at the bottom left with identical sailorsuirs are presumably brothers. Image courtesy of the MD collection. |
The boys in this class wear quite a range of different outfits beside sailor suits. Room does not yet allow us to show some of these outfirs, but as our assessment of this page continues we hope tomadd some additional iamges to highlight some of these outfits.
We do not notice any boys wearing the floppy bows that were so popular in the late 19th century. Several bows wear scarves with their sailor scarves and a few have very small bows. One boy wears a huge neck tie that dies not seem to go with the rest of his oyrfit.
Almost all of the boys wear solid color long-sleeved shirts. We do not notice any patterened shirts at all. This is another indication that the image was a pre-World War I portrait. Quite a few boys wear a variety of shirts without jackets or sweters.
As far as we can tell, all of the boys wear short pants or kneepants. The length varies from knee length to well below thecknees. Many boys have suspenders to hold their pants up. We have read that corduroy was a very popular fabric for bpys pants, but we note very few examples in these class portarits wear the boys can seen to be wearing corduroy pants. Perhaps the corduroy facbric does not show up well in these photographs.
We do not see any boys wearing lederhosen. We also do not see lederhosn halters. Other class portraits taken at about this time shows many boys of this age wearung lederhosen. We believe this is because that lederhosen at the turn of the 20th century in German were still a regional style--worn in southern Germany, especially Gavaria, and Austria. Thus this school was probably in northern Germany.
The boys herecwear a wide range of hosiery. We notice both socks of various lengths and stockings. As both are commonly worn it suggests that it is Spring and the weather is warming up. All of the boys wearing long stockings have dark-colored long stockings. This is one factor suggesting to us that this is a pre-World War I portrait. After World War I, darker colored long stockings became more common.
Figure 4.--Notice the metal studs in the soles of the shoes that these boys are wearing. Presumbably these shoes would last for ever. Image courtesy of the MD collection. |
Most boys wear sturdy high-top shoes. We do not notice any sandals or sneakers. We dp note several boys wearing metal studs in the soles of their shoes--rather like hob nail boots (figure 4). This is interesting, because usually boys in these portraits are posedcso you can not see the soles of their shoes. This image suggests that quite a few boys had these metal studs. A HBC reader writes, "Assuming all the boys had boots like this, the noise they must have made walking on pavement must have been incredible." An American reader recalls, "I was in second grade and after Christmas wore a newpair of cowboy boots to school. I was very proub of my new boots, but got into all kinds of trouble because of the noise they made in the hall--and there was no metal studs. Heven only knows the decible level this lot made made when they were moving together in the halls. Nore that none of the boys are barefoot. This suggests that the boys came from an affluent community. We wonder id the season was also a factor. We think that voys in the city coming to school barefoot was an indicator of poverty. We do not know if climate or seasinality was also a factor.
These boys have very severe hair cuts indeed. Most of the boys had either very close-cropped hair cuts or bangs. We only notice one boy that has enough hair for a part. The boys here in many instances do not seem to have just close cropped hair cits, but some boys seen to have shaved heads. We wonder just how their hair was cut. Such severe hair cuts must have required at least weekly clipping. We winder if some boys actually had their hair shaved. Presumably this woud have been done by their mothers.
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