Unknown Primary School

Figure 1.--This French school in the early 1900s required a military-like uniform with knee pants. Note the one boy in a sailor suit. Also note that the school did not require kneepants, several boys wear long trousers.

HBC is attempting to assess French schoolwear trends. We have assembled a good deal of information on different types of garments, but an accurate assessment of trends over time and conventions remains elusive. Thus HBC is assembling images of invidual schools. One a number of schools have been assesmbled it will enable us to better understand trends over time and accepted conventions. Unfortunately often little information is available on the schools pictured in many available images. HBC will do its best to assess these images. Hopefully our French consultants will be able to add additional details.

Type

HBC is not sure what type of school the boys go to. It looks to be an elementary school, but I am not sure if it is a private or state school. The boys wear military-styled uniforms, I'm not sure at this stage whether the wearing of uniforms was more common ar state or private schools. It could be a military school, but if this was the case, I don't think a boy would have been allowed to wear a sailior suit rather than the school uniform. As with most French schools at the time, the school was a single gender school.

Chronology

I'm not positive about the date of this photograph, but would speculate about the turn of the century in the early 1900s.

Class

The children in this class appear to be elementary school age boys, about 10 years old. As they are about the same age, one would assume it was one class at this particular school.

Teacher

The teacher is in the middle of the photograph, but the image is not clear enough to make out much about him.

Clothing

The boys in this class are military styled uniforms. One boy stands out in a sailor suit, which were very popular in Francde at the time.

Headgear

None of the boys in the photograph wear headgear so it is not known what kind of caps they wore. Almost certainly there were caps, but probably not berets. To my knowledge the beret was not associated with uniforms until French Boy Scouts began wearing them in the 1910s. This is, however, only a preliminary asessment by HBC that requires confirmation.

Smocks

None of these boys wear smocks. Presumably because of the military styling of the uniforms, the school would not want them covered up with a smock. At other French schools, however, boys of this age would commonly wear smocks.

Jacket

Most of the boys wear similar jacket-like military tunics. They are somewhat longer than ordinary suit jackets. Most appear to have double breasted brass buttons. While most of the boys are so dressed, at least one boy appears to wear a regular jacket. Also the one boy in the sailor suit wears a middy blouse. The fact that so many children wear the same double breasted jackets suggests that the school had a strict ruke about the uniform. Why the exceptions were allowed is not known.

Pants

Most of the boys as was common at the time wear kneepants and long stockings. This does not appear, however, to have been a school requirement. Some of the boys wear long pants. As this is probably a single class, all of the boys would have been about the same age. Thus while the school appears to have set a style for the jackets, it was up to the parents to choose whether the boys wore kneepants or long pants.

Socks

The boys in kneepants all appear to be wearing long stockings.

Shoes

It is difficult to tell precisely from this image, but the boys appear to be mostly wearing heavy The boys appear to wear boots or heavy shoes. None of the boys wear shoes or sandals.

Hair Styles

Akk of the boys wear similar length hair styles. None wear hair over their ears, but none have especially short cuts.

Created: February 19, 2000
Last updated: February 19, 2000