We don't know the purpose of this newspaper...
Item # 697617Sorry, but this item is no longer available. Please be in touch at info@rarenewspapers.com if you would like to be placed on a want list or are interested in a potential alternate issue.
December 01, 1898
DEVELOPMENT, Elwyn, Pennsylvania, Dec. 1, 1898 A very curious little publication, noted in the masthead is: "The Working Hand Makes Strong The Working Brain". And the logo in the masthead includes: "Not What I have - But What I do, is My Kingdom".
Four pages, 7 1/2 by 10 1/2 inches, very nice condition.
background: The publication "Development" was the official monthly journal of the Pennsylvania Training School for Feeble-Minded Children (now Elwyn) and served as a tangible manifestation of the "industrial training" movement that dominated late 19th-century institutional care. The mottos you noted—drawn from the Victorian philosopher Thomas Carlyle—underscore the school's core mission: to transform individuals deemed "unproductive" by society into useful citizens through manual labor. During this era under Superintendent Dr. Martin Barr, the newspaper was actually typeset and printed by the residents themselves in the school’s print shop, acting as both a vocational exercise and a promotional tool to prove to the state and private donors that the "working hand" was indeed "strengthening the brain." Because these small-run institutional papers were often discarded, a well-preserved copy from 1898 is a rare artifact of medical and social history, capturing a period when Elwyn was a world-renowned model for the education and "moral treatment" of the developmentally disabled.
Four pages, 7 1/2 by 10 1/2 inches, very nice condition.
background: The publication "Development" was the official monthly journal of the Pennsylvania Training School for Feeble-Minded Children (now Elwyn) and served as a tangible manifestation of the "industrial training" movement that dominated late 19th-century institutional care. The mottos you noted—drawn from the Victorian philosopher Thomas Carlyle—underscore the school's core mission: to transform individuals deemed "unproductive" by society into useful citizens through manual labor. During this era under Superintendent Dr. Martin Barr, the newspaper was actually typeset and printed by the residents themselves in the school’s print shop, acting as both a vocational exercise and a promotional tool to prove to the state and private donors that the "working hand" was indeed "strengthening the brain." Because these small-run institutional papers were often discarded, a well-preserved copy from 1898 is a rare artifact of medical and social history, capturing a period when Elwyn was a world-renowned model for the education and "moral treatment" of the developmentally disabled.
Category: Post-Civil War
