A class photograph taken over 118 years ago, shows the children of Tilery Road Infants School. The plaque reads ’Tilery Rd Infants, No.3’
Picture Stockton Archive
A Pictorial History of Stockton-on-Tees
A class photograph taken over 118 years ago, shows the children of Tilery Road Infants School. The plaque reads ’Tilery Rd Infants, No.3’
What a wonderful photo, the school must have been quite new in 1895 and I see most of the children were wearing shoes. I attended Tilery Infants and have a group photo taken in 1945.
By 1895 compulsory education for children between 5-12 years old had only been in place some 15 years. It seems inconceivable now, that before the 1870 Education Act the upper classes of the Industrial Revolution feared that the ‘education’ of working people would actually start to make them ‘think’! It was also widely feared amongst factory-owners that the supply of ‘cheap’ child-labour, would be vastly reduced. Education, therefore represented a means of escape from grinding poverty, to many of the working classes and was eagerly, further-pursued at night-schools and Trade Union funded classes offered by the WEA.