School desk
Category
Education objects
Date
circa 1800 - circa 1899
Materials
Wood and iron
Measurements
914 mm (length); 590 mm (width); 442 mm (height)
Order this imageCollection
Sudbury Hall Museum of Childhood, Derbyshire
NT 665318
Summary
A wooden 19th century school desk to seat two children. Two pairs of iron legs are joined to two corresponding flat metal bases. The tops of the legs are screwed onto the desk, the shelf beneath the desk and the corresponding hinged seat as a single unit. On the front of the desk are narrow slits which would have held slates and a circular hole which would have originally held an inkwell. Two chequer board patterns are impressed into the desk demarcating each child's place.
Provenance
'Derbyshire Museum Service History of Education Collection' - a collection established by Derbyshire Museum Service (through gifts from individuals, Derbyshire schools and purchases) in the 1940s and stored at Sudbury Hall from the early 1970s to 2012. The National Trust managed the collection between 1991 and 2012 when legal ownership was transferred from Derbyshire County Council to the National Trust. Archival records information - "The collection was established as a result of isolated gifts in the 1940's, and the 'savings' of certain school records (now passed to County Records) during wartime paper salvage." "During the 1950s it was L.E.A. practice to hold an Easter Course for teachers, and the County (Derbyshire) Museum arranged a special exhibition for teach course. As by the mid 1950s quite a collection had already accumulated, it was decided to produce an exhibition on the history of education with special reference to Derbyshire. Consequently, further material was purchased, from which items were selected. The exhibition was subsequently shown at a number of centres, and after disbandment, additions continued to be made with the aim of eventually producing a reconstructed classroom as a base for research. The Derby Bishop Lonsdale College of Education has frequently made use of the collection in various ways."