The Extraordinary Ordinary Lives Of Children In Early Subiaco.
So what was it like to be a child in the early years of Subiaco ? A wonderful description about the lives of children in the early years of Subiaco can be found in the books about the history of Subiaco by Ken Spillman.
Australian author Ken Spillman wrote two comprehensive books about the history of the City of Subiaco. The first book is titled 'Identity Prized A History of Subiaco' and is about the early history of Western Australia and Subiaco published in 1985. The second book about Subiaco is called 'Tales of a singular city. Subiaco since the 1970's' was published in 2006.
The story Spillman (1985) tells in 'Identity Prized A History' is an inclusive story not just of the successful powerful men doing extraordinary things to create the City of Subiaco but also the extraordinary, ordinary, social and cultural lives of men, women and children at home and at the various types of state and church run schools and institutions. The stories are told not only through a huge archived collection of documents from the times written mostly by men but also a wide range of oral histories and personal written reminiscences submitted to the Subiaco Historical Society by the men and women who lived through those times. The stories of their reminiscences as children are supplemented with some beautiful black and white photos of children with their families, in school and playing in the environment.
Many stories from children themselves about what was important in their lives can be found through the children's pages in the various newspapers of the times. Children were often asked write about their thoughts on a particular topic of interest to them for example what they did on their school holidays, their favourite possessions, events like the Royal Agricultural Society Show or what they thought about Perth. The essays and letters were published in the newspaper and prizes were given for what were considered to be the best essays according to age groups. It is difficult to know how much help, if any children had from their parents or siblings, but in some cases such as the Catholic papers the children's essays submitted for competitions needed to be supported by a teacher's validation that were the student's own work and by the local priest before being submitted and published.
Below are some paragraphs about the extraordinary, ordinary lives of children. Much of the history about the Subiaco State School opened in 1897 was written from male headmaster's journals and official documents written by males of the time.
There is little about the female teachers who taught at the schools in the City of Subiaco. Research on some of the female headmistresses in the Infants' School at Subiaco State School showed that throughout their teaching careers teachers that taught at the school had stood up for women's rights in equal pay and progressed to roles including superintendent of kindergartens ensuring children in early childhood received a good education. There are horrific yet acceptable for the time accounts of the physical punishment dealt to children at school by both male and female teachers.
Spillman (1985) writes about the lives of children in Subiaco in the late 1800's and early 1900's...
Spillman (1985) writes about children...
"...Children too had household chores. There was the daily ritual of boot polishing, and there was firewood to collect or chop; there were lamps to fill with kerosene, candles to set and knives that needed to be filled. One woman recalls..."
"...Rigid obedience, rigid discipline, rigid authoritarianism was the practice of the day. That discipline was enforced in schools. It was reinforced in the home, and there was absolute segregation between the duties of boys and girls in the home. There was no sharing of duties - with one exception, now I come to think of it. It was doing the dishes...the heavy task fell to the boys...because the girls in turn had their tasks, their tasks were to make the beds, help lay the table for breakfast, help mother get the meal and do the dishes before they went to school..."
"...Girls also helped their mothers with what was, due to dress habits which made no concession to their lifestyle and conditions of the time, an extremely formidable task: the washing. Accomplished hygienically by boiling a large 'copper' filled with water the washing was a chore which needed doing alarmingly often, as often indeed, as the family's supply of water allowed. Subiaco's settler were people accustomed to wearing a large number of clothes and, with even young boys sometimes wearing white frills, the black sand of Subiaco wreaked havoc. A woman who attended school in Subiaco remembered that... " The washing that went on was colossal - the number of clothes that were worn, the ironing, the goffering of the frills on our petticoats and pants, the pinafores we wore to school over our dark clothes to save them..."
"....Yet, neither parents concerned to keep a good house and build a better suburb nor teachers working to discipline their charges and impart the essentials of a Victorian education could prevent the children of the nineties from finding time for themselves. Organised leisure activities for children were rare, but the developing area was rich in possibilities and an endless variety of games were played in nearby scrub, or around building sites. The large number of children growing up in Subiaco during this period knew each other well: they went to school together, played together, fought one another, and looked to one another for romantic attachments..." (Spillman, 1985, p. 101).
"...The few organised activities available to children were run by the school or by one of the Sunday schools...Picnics organised by the Sunday schools, held at such places as Crawley, Peppermint Grove, Cottesloe, Guildford and Canning Bridge provided many of the children of Subiaco with some of their happiest memories...(Spillman, 1985, p.102).
"...Generally, Subiaco's 'improvers' were people who led fairly unsettled lives, most having lived in several places before their arrival in the west. The majority were working-class people educated in the art of survival than in the refinements of bourgeois culture, and more inclined to fill their leisure time with outdoor activities than violin practice or poetry readings. Nevertheless, the nineties saw a wide variety of 'cultural' clubs spring into being and most received wide support, a mark, perhaps of the commitment of the people to their vision of Subiaco as a model suburb...Additionally, there were dances, sporting functions and occasionally, travelling entertainers to be enjoyed in Victoria Hall...Several of the churches also built halls and church concerts were widely supported events. Such activities nurtured a feeling of belonging, strengthening bonds between neighbours and re-affirming their already strong sense of community identity..." (Spillman, 1985, p.107).
"...At Subiaco School, while the girls were endowed with sporting talents or a yen for physical release were encouraged to channel their energy into sewing, boys were coached in the skills of cricket and Australian football..." (Spillman, 1985, p. 103).
"...Strict - often - violent - discipline was an integral part of the educational philosophy of the time, not only accepted but expected by parents and higher authorities alike...(Spillman, 1985, p. 142).
"...While such 'hidings' were meted out for a wide variety of seemly minor misdemeanours, it was generally more out of concern for the sacred cows of respect and obedience than the for the effect of such transgressions on a child's formal education. Schooling, whether at Subiaco, Thomas Street, Jolimont or Rosalie, was widely viewed a little more than the introductory phase on an apprenticeship in the world of paid work. For girls it was seen as a preparation for the unpaid tasks of socialising children and serving the men they would marry. Reading, writing and arithmetic - the fundamental skills deemed necessary to participate in society - were taught, and considerable time was spent reinforcing the key tenets of white Australia's most precious faiths, learning scripture and repeatedly enouncing loyalty to the British Crown. In addition, often while boys were experiencing the exhilaration of learning mastery over various types of leather balls, girls received instruction in more domestic matters. For some years girls from Rosalie School attended Subiaco for special guidance and practice in both cooking and laundering. All schools conducted sewing lessons, and prowess with a needle and thread carried with it as much prestige as did good marks in spelling and arithmetic.
This relative indifference to standards of formal education in the arts and sciences was probably in large due to the absence of any real opportunity for the vast majority of Western Australia's children, particularly the children of the labouring classes, to undertake secondary or tertiary education..." (Spillman, 1985, p.151 - 152).
