Of the Education of the Poor Being the First Part of a Digest of the Reports of the Society for Bettering the Condition of the Poor, and Containing a Selection of Those Articles which Have a Reference to Education

London: : Printed for the Society, by W. Bulmer and Co. Cleveland-row; and sold by J. Hatchard, Piccadilly, and the rest of the booksellers to the Society., 1809 iv, 376, [4, index] printed pages; 8vo. All edges speckled. Marbled endpapers. Uncommon, contemporary commercial label on front paste-down endpaper of L. Wickham, Bookseller & Binder Heck Street, Maidstone "Magazines & Reviews &c.". Original silk ribbon place-marker. Some sporadic foxing. 14 x 22 cm. Contemporary half calf. Spine in compartments with hand-tooled, gilt rules and decorative centerpieces (slightly rubbed and worn at the head). Hinges cracked but still reasonably firm. Boards with marbled paper covers and calf corners with gilt rules (bumped and slightly worn). Compilation of reports on specific schools, industry schools, Sunday schools and endowed schools, together with a long essay on the "general education of the poor" by Thomas Bernard, and reports on the education of the poor in Ireland and in Scotland. by Sir Thomas Bernard, together with Wilberforce and the Bishop of Durham, had established the Society for Bettering the Condition of the Poor in 1796. Bernard (1750-1818) was one of the originators of the cooperative movement in England, and a noted philanthropist who, with Wilberforce and others, founded in 1796 the Society for Bettering the Condition and increasing the Comforts of the Poor. Among the immediate results of his recommendations was the formation, in 1800, of a school for the indigent blind, and in 1801 of the Fever Institution. He also promoted vaccination, and campaigned for protecting children in cotton mills and as the apprentices of chimney-sweeps. Prior to the Education Act of 1870, formal education in England and Wales was largely restricted to children whose parents could afford to be sending them to private fee-paying schools. Copac locates 11 copies.. 1st Edition. Hardcover. Very Good.