Randomguy Posted May 28, 2014 Share #1 Posted May 28, 2014 It’s commonly believed that school kids started taking summers off in the 19th century so they’d have time to work on the farm. Nice as that story is, it isn’t true. Summer vacation has little to do with tilling fields and more to do with sweaty, rich city kids playing hooky and their sweaty, rich parents. Before the Civil War, farm kids never had summers off. They went to school during the hottest and coldest months and stayed home during the spring and fall, when crops needed to be planted and harvested. Meanwhile, city kids hit the books all year long—summers included. In 1842, Detroit’s academic year lasted 260 days! But as cities got denser, they got hotter. Endless lanes of brick and concrete transformed urban blocks into kilns, thanks to the “urban heat island effect.” That’s when America’s swelling middle and upper class families started hightailing it to the cooler countryside. And that caused a problem. School attendance wasn’t mandatory back then, and classrooms were being left half-empty each summer. Something had to give. Legislators, in one of those if-you-can’t-beat-‘em-join-‘em moments, started arguing that kids should get summers off anyway. It helped that, culturally, leisure time was becoming more important. With the dawn of labor unions and the eight-hour workday, working adults were getting more time to themselves than ever before. Advocates for vacation time also argued (incorrectly) that the brain was a muscle, and like any muscle, it could suffer injuries if overused. From there, they argued that students shouldn’t go to school year-round because it could strain their brains. To top it off, air conditioning was decades away, and city schools during summertime were miserable, half-empty ovens. So by the turn of the century, urban districts had managed to cut about 60 schooldays from the most sweltering part of the year. Rural schools soon adopted the same pattern so they wouldn’t fall behind. Business folks obviously saw an opportunity here. The summer vacation biz soon ballooned into what is now one of the country’s largest billion-dollar industries. http://mentalfloss.com/article/56901/why-do-students-get-summers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kzoo Posted May 28, 2014 Share #2 Posted May 28, 2014 And the next thing you are going to try to convince us of...... Henry Ford didn't build cars........... followed by the news that Neil Armstrong never walked on the moon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nate Posted May 28, 2014 Share #3 Posted May 28, 2014 you mean Lance Armstrong don't you? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kzoo Posted May 28, 2014 Share #4 Posted May 28, 2014 you mean Lance Armstrong don't you? No, Lance was the trumpet player? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nate Posted May 28, 2014 Share #5 Posted May 28, 2014 this is a cycling forum, I just assumed you meant Louis Armstrong Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kzoo Posted May 28, 2014 Share #6 Posted May 28, 2014 Was Louie the author or was that Lori. The problem here is summer vacation. Since kids had to stay home and work the fields they created summer vacation and I spent my summers forgetting important facts like Louis testing positive for PEDs Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Randomguy Posted May 28, 2014 Author Share #7 Posted May 28, 2014 I have a friend who takes summers off every year. He gets contract jobs and just leaves every summer. I like the way he thinks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nate Posted May 28, 2014 Share #8 Posted May 28, 2014 I got a friend who takes winters off but he just gets drunk then finds another job Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kzoo Posted May 28, 2014 Share #9 Posted May 28, 2014 I got a friend who takes winters off but he just gets drunk then finds another job Who hires drunks? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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