Figure 1.-- Going barefoot was not enirely a sign of poverty. We noticed children going barefoot in Finland during the summer well into the post-War era when Finland was able to ease away from the Soviet hold and participate more fully with the burgeoning economy of Western Europe. A reader has provided a village smnapshot and tells us, "This photo was taken during summertime 1959 at a kindergarten in Ylöjärvi,, in the Pirkanmaa region of Finland. Going barefoot was and still is quite common for Finnish children during their brief Summer season."
We see Finnish children wearing the same kind of footwear that was common in he Baltic area. Rural children were somewhat different. They very commonly went barefoot in the warm summer weather. Of course during the cold winter this was not possible, but it was very common in the countryside. To what extent it affected city children we are not sure, but it was less common. It seenms to have been more common in small towns and villages. This was in part an economic matter. Finland until after World War II was a relatively poor country. And because of forced ties with the motibond Soviet socialist economy did not recover from the War as fast as Western European market-based economies. Going barefoot was not enirely a sign of poverty. We noticed children going barefoot in Finland during the summer well into the post-War era when Finland was able to ease away from the Soviet hold and participate more fully with the burgeoning economy of Western Europe. A reader has provided a village smnapshot and tells us, "This photo was taken during summertime 1959 at a kindergarten in Ylöjärvi,, in the Pirkanmaa region of Finland. Going barefoot was and still is quite common for Finnish children during their brief Summer season."
