38 Amazing Vintage Photos That Document U.S. Classroom Scenes From the Late 1800s to the Early 1900s
Frances Benjamin Johnston (1864-1952) was born during the American Civil War. Her 60-year career as a photographer began with portrait, news, and documentary work then turned to a focus on contemporary architecture and gardens, culminating in a survey of historic buildings in the southern United States.
In the 1880s, Johnston studied art in Paris and then returned home to Washington, DC, where she learned photography. She quickly established a national reputation as a professional photographer and businesswoman, with growing success in both the art and commercial worlds.
Johnston counted presidents, diplomats, and other government officials among her portrait clients, while in her personal life she travelled in more Bohemian circles.
In the 1890s and early 1900s, as one of the first photojournalists, she provided images to the Bain News Service syndicate and wrote illustrated articles for many magazines. Her active roles in pictorialist photo exhibitions and world’s fairs reflect her high level of energy and determination as well as her exceptional photographic talent.
An interest in progressive education resulted in pioneering projects to document students at public schools in Washington, DC; the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama; the Hampton Institute in Virginia; and the Carlisle Indian Industrial School in Pennsylvania.
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| Thanksgiving Day lesson at Whittier, 1899-1900 |
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| Outdoor class in botany, Washington, DC, ca. 1899 |
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| Students of 8th Division school using rulers, yardsticks, and measuring tape in school yard, Washington, DC, ca. 1899 |
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| Two girls and a boy pumping water at well of Hampton Institute graduate, 1899-1900 |
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| Women painting at easels in a class at the Art Students’ League, Washington, DC, 1889 |
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| Group of public school children offering peanuts to animals in the National Zoo, Washington, DC, ca. 1899 |
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| Isadora Duncan’s dance students, early 1900s |
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| Machine shop class, Washington, DC, ca. 1899 |
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| Art class, sketching ducks at zoo, Normal school, ca. 1899 |
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| Hampton Institute, Hampton, Va., ca. 1898 – 11 students in uniform playing guitars, banjos, mandolins, and cello |
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| Louis Firetail (Sioux, Crow Creek), wearing tribal clothing, giving a presentation in an American history class, Hampton Institute, Hampton, Virginia, 1899-1900 |
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| 6th Division mathematics class on a street paving problem, ca. 1899 |
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| A class at the zoo – the bird cage, ca. 1899 |
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| A class in dressmaking, Hampton Institute, Hampton, Virginia, 1899 |
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| Art class with live model, Normal School, Washington, DC, ca. 1899 |
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| Classroom scenes in Washington, D.C. public schools – outdoor exercise with rods – 3rd Division, ca. 1899 |
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| History class at the Tuskegee Institute |
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| School children on a field trip |
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| School children conducting simple experiments, Washington, DC, 1899 |
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| School children examining wild flowers on field trip, Washington, DC, 1899 |
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| School children learning a dance in a school yard, Washington, DC, 1899 |
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| School children measuring and sketching at a stone building, Washington, DC, 1899 |
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| Schoolgirls doing calisthenics |
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| Cooking class |
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| Elementary school class on Native American Culture |
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| Female students exercising with dumbbells, Western High School, Washington, DC, 1899 |
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| Geography class at the Hampton Institute |
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| Girls in a science laboratory at Eastern High School, Washington, DC, 1899 |
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| Girls on the playground, 1899 |
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| 2nd Division grade school pupils examining a mailbox |
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| 6 girls in art class, drawing at easels, Eastern High School, Washington, DC, 1899 |
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| Academie Julian, Paris, group of art students, 1885 |
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| African American children and teacher in classroom studying corn and cotton, Annie Davis School, near Tuskegee, Alabama, 1902 |
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| African American schoolgirls with teacher, learning to cook on a wood stove in classroom, 1899 |
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| American Indian and African American students at Hampton Institute, men and women in chemistry lab, 1899 |
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| American Indian and African American students at Hampton Institute, women studying human respiratory system, 1899 |
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| Art class |
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| Class of the Sixth Division at the Library of Congress, 1899 |
Feelin’ Groovy: Fascinating Vintage Color Pictures of High School Fashion Across America in 1969
“The latest rule in girls’ high school fashion,” LIFE magazine proclaimed in 1969, “is that there isn’t any.”
In contrast to the popular fashions and styles of certain decades the Gibson Girl of the 1890s and early 1900s, the flapper of the Roaring Twenties, the “New Look” of the Fifties there was no single reigning style in the 1960s. Even as the slim-cut trousers and shift dresses of the late Fifties crept in, Mod miniskirts and go-go boots found their way over from London to mingle with the bell-bottomed jeans and fringed vests of the latter part of the decade. By 1969, the fashion choices of tens of millions of young American men and women were as variegated and ever-evolving as the world around them.
A “freaky new freedom,” LIFE called it. Was it ever!
Cultural transformation was an irresistible force during the Sixties, and across America and around the globe civil rights, women’s and gay liberation, the sexual revolution and, of course, the explosive soundtrack of R&B, soul and rock and roll informed everything from politics to fashion.
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| Students at Woodside High in California, 1969. |
By 1969, America’s youth had not only soaked in more visual and auditory stimuli in a few years than most previous generations combined, but had re-imagined virtually all of that input in the form of sartorial self-expression. Take a look back through these fascinating pictures taken by LIFE photographer Arthur Schatz:
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| Student Rosemary Shoong at Beverly Hills High School, wearing a dress she made herself, 1969. |
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| Beverly Hills High classmates showed off their fashions, 1969. |
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| High school teacher Sandy Brockman wore a bold print dress, 1969. |
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| Beverly Hills High School student Erica Farber, wearing a checkered and tiered outfit, walked with a boy, 1969. |
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| Corona del Mar High School students Kim Robertson, Pat Auvenshine and Pam Pepin wore “hippie” fashions, 1969. |
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| A Southern California high school student walked toward classmates while wearing the “Mini Jupe” skirt, 1969. |
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| A Southern California high schooler wore a buckskin vest and other hippie fashions, 1969. |
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| High school students wore “hippie” fashion, 1969. |
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| High schooler Nina Nalhaus wore wool pants and a homemade jacket in Denver, Colo., 1969. |
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| High schooler Lenore Reday stopped traffic while wearing a bell-bottomed jump suit in Newport Beach, Calif., 1969. |
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| A Southern California high school student wore an old-fashioned tapestry skirt and wool shawl, 1969. |
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| Southern California high school students, 1969. |
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| High school fashions, 1969. |
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| High school fashions, 1969. |
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| High school fashion, 1969. |
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| A high school student wore bell bottoms and boots, 1969. |
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| High school fashions, 1969. |
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| A Kansas high school student wore a mini skirt, 1969. |
70 Rare Vintage Photographs Capture Everyday Life at Carlisle Indian Industrial School in the Early 1900s
Carlisle and similar schools have been controversial because many Native Americans say that these forced children to leave their families at young ages, and to give up their own cultures, languages, religion and even their names, doing psychological damage to generations. Since the 1970s, Native American nations have taken back control of the education of their children and started their own schools and colleges.
