Life for Children in Colonial Boston

Games, Clothing, Education for Kids in Early America

Nov 16, 2009

Padded caps were the fashion for toddlers. Stays were common for both boys and girls. If you were a schoolboy, you could expect to be called a "gnurly wretch."

Most people in colonial Boston were not men or women, but children. Records from the mid-1760s indicate that white children under 16 represented 52 percent of Boston’s population.

Of those, a shocking percentage never survived to adulthood. In colonial America, half of children died before reaching the age of five. Children were especially vulnerable to illnesses. In 1744, Ephraim Snow watched four of his children die within four weeks of “throat distempter.” His wife followed the children to the grave a few weeks later.

For babies, swaddling was the norm for easier handling. All babies wore caps—frequently with lace edging. Mothers put puddings—padded caps—on the heads of unsteady toddlers.

Up until age seven or so, boys and girls dressed much the same, either in bed gowns made of cheap printed linen or cotton, or frocks. Some boys and girls, even as young as 1 year old, wore stays made of bone or leather. Parents believed stays ensured good posture.

Amusements for girls included dolls. Many imported dolls had wooden bodies and bisque—unglazed china—heads and hands. Games for boys included pitching horseshoes, playing huzzlecap (something like pitching pennies), shooting marbles, whipping tops, and playing stoolball, a game in which a ball is bowled at a three-legged stool defended by a batter. In winter, both girls and boys skated.

Girls and boys might be employed in weaving on small looms—tape looms, garter looms or belt looms—producing such articles as shoestrings, hat bands, and garters.

Books especially for children were available. One popular title in New England was A Token for Children, being an Exact Account of the Conversions Holy and Exemplary Lives and Joyful Deaths of Several Young Children. Another was The Afflicted Parents, or the Undutiful Child Punished. Lighter fare included Mr. Winlove’s Collection of Stories and Puzzling Cap, A Collection of Riddles. Many boys and girls attended private neighborhood schools until about age seven. Then, a girl, if her parents could afford it, might continue to be educated privately for “female embellishments.” Activities for a five-year-old girl might include sewing and lessons in dancing, playing the harpsicord, and French.

Meanwhile boys—white boys—could attend schools. The town provided them for free for boys. In 1765, some 908 boys were enrolled in five public schools—three “writing schools,” which stressed penmanship and mathematics, and two “Latin schools” tailored for boys bound for Harvard College. Boston boys learning penmanship in those days were likely to face writing master Johnny Tileston whose favored term for each student was “you gnurly wretch” and who had the habit of wiping off his pens with his finger, and wiping his fingers on his hair under his wig.

As for the boys going to Latin school, many of them had to contend with Master John Lovell, well known for frequent application of his ferrule on the hands of his scholars to better appreciate the beauty of Greek and Latin. These Latin school boys felt themselves superior to the writing school boys. The Latin boys called themselves “gentlemen” while referring to the writing school students as mere “boys.”

Schoolteachers had an assortment of tools and methods at their disposal for disciplining a child. For striking the child, there was the birch rod, the flapper (a heavy piece of leather fastened to a handle), and the tattling stick (a cat-o-nine tails with leather straps). To stop a child from talking, there were whispering sticks, which were wooden gags tied to the mouth with strings. One tool to get a child’s attention was a thimble, which the teacher tapped forcefully against a child’s head. Yet another tool of discipline was a yoke for yoking to children together.

Only about half of all boys attended school. Many boys became apprentices to printers, bookbinders, wigmakers or one of many other master artisans and craftsmen. Some boys became apprentices as young as 7 years old. An orphaned and illegitimate boy might be compelled into an apprenticeship. It was one way a town reduced its welfare population. But often apprenticeships were arranged by the boy’s family. Besides preparing the boy for a life as a skilled craftsman, such an arrangement reduced the financial burden on the family. Sometimes it rid the family of a troublesome child.

Sources:

Baumgarten, Linda. What Clothes Reveal: The Language of Clothing in Colonial and Federal America. Williamsburg, Virginia, The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 2002.

Bell, J.L. “From Saucy Boys to Sons of Liberty.” In Marten, James. Children in Colonial America. New York, New York University Press, 2006.

Bridenbaugh, Carl. Cities in Revolt: Urban Life in America, 1743-1776. London, Oxford University Press, 1955.

Earle, Alice Morse, Child Life in Colonial Days. Williamstown, Massachusetts, Corner House Publishers, 1975.

Fowler, William M., Jr. The Baron of Beacon Hill: A Biography of John Hancock. Boston, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1980.

Gross, Robert A. The Minutemen and their World. New York, Hill and Wang, 1976.

Gunderson, Joan R., To Be Useful to the World. New York, Twayne Publishers, 1996.

Huff, Randall, The Revolutionary War Era. Westport, Connecticut, Greenwood Press, 2004.

Labaree, Benjamin W. Colonial Massachusetts: A History. Millwood, New York KTO Press, 1979.

Tunis, Edwin. Colonial Craftsmen and the Beginnings of American Industry. Cleveland, The World Publishing Co., 1965.

Winslow, Anna Green. Diary of Anna Green Winslow, A Boston School Girl of 1771. Earle, Alice Morse, editor. Boston, Houghton, Mifflin and Company, 1894.

The copyright of the article Life for Children in Colonial Boston in Colonial America is owned by Brian Deming. Permission to republish Life for Children in Colonial Boston in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.