Figure 1.--All of the boys at this French primary school in 1930 wear smocks, almost all of them dark blue or black smocks. There was, however some difference in the style of the smocks.

HBC notes in the 1930s a range of trends concerning school smocks at primary schools. We note in some schools that only some of the boys wore smocks. We have not noted primary schools where none of the boys wore smocks. At some schools all or virtually all of the boys wore smocks. We wonder if this is not an indication that the school insisted that the boys wear smocks. We note that usually where there are not school rules that often there is considerable diversity. We think in unlikely that every boy would wear a smock if it was not required. We note that in the 1930s that some boys did not wear school smocks, although it is difficult to assess how common this was with the limited information currently at hand.

Image

All of the boys in this 1930 French class appear to be wearing short pants with their school smocks. Almost all of the boys wear their collars under their smocks which are collarless. We notice that only a few of the boys appear to be wearing kneesocks. Most of the boys seem to be wearing dark ling stockings. We had thought that long stockings wee not as common in France as in other countries. We will have to look into this in more detail. Perhaps the use of long stockings in France was subject to regional differences.

Trends

We note some variance at French schools as to how common school smocks were in the 1930s. HBC notes in the 1930s a range of trends concerning school smocks at primary schools. We note in some schools that only some of the boys wore smocks. We have not noted primary schools where none of the boys wore smocks. At some schools all or virtually all of the boys wore smocks. We wonder if this is not an indication that the school insisted that the boys wear smocks. We note that usually where there are not school rules that often there is considerable diversity. We think in unlikely that every boy would wear a smock if it was not required. We note that in the 1930s that some boys did not wear school smocks, although it is difficult to assess how common this was with the limited information currently at hand.

Demographics

we think tghat the plain dark smocks like the boys here wear were most common in rural, village schools. A French reader tells us that boy in the cities, especially by the late 1930s tended to wear more fashionable smocks. We have numerous images of village schools with the children wearing plain dark smocks. We do not yet have many images of children wearing the more fashionable smocks we have seen advertized in advertisements and catalogs.

Tyoe of School

We believe that schools which required the boys to wear smocks were in some cases Catholic rather than the village schools. Catholic schools were often more strict than the state schools. Our information here is still quite limited. One example is the Ecole St. Vincent Ardent in 1937. We assume the name of the school means that this was A Catholic school, but are not even entirely sure about this.

Individual Schools

We are building a chronological list of French schools. We have a 20th century page, but have not yet created a separate 1930s page. We plan to do so soon.