© 2004 by Society for the Social History of Medicine
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Just a Breath of Fresh Air in an Industrial Landscape? The Preston Open Air School in 1926: A School Medical Service Insight
1 8 Jasmine Road, Walton-le-Dale, Preston, Lancashire PR5 4NA, UK. E-mail: dh254{at}waitrose.com
Historians who have studied the early twentieth-century development of the open air school movement for physically debilitated children have largely maintained that the therapeutic benefit of the fresh air environment in such schools was the predominant emphasis of the movement. It is suggested that this stemmed from the movement's belief that, although other factors such as poverty and poor diet may have contributed to it, the greater cause of physical debility amongst working-class children was the lack of fresh air within crowded industrial towns and cities. Such debility was sometimes identified as a ‘pre-tuberculous’ condition, possibly leading to tuberculosis. This article provides a local dimension to the discussion, through an appraisal of the operation and philosophy of the Preston Open Air School in 1925–6, as revealed in a review of the school undertaken by the Preston School Medical Service in 1926. In assessing the priorities that prevailed here, the wider open air school movement's background and the particular influences of Preston and its school medical service are considered. The article concludes that care philosophy at the Preston Open Air School was holistic rather than concentrated on fresh air. It also confirms the view that such schools set patterns for future educational welfare.
Keywords: child-health, debility, fresh air, exercise, food, housing, schools, hygiene, poverty, ignorance