Supper Time by B. Pothast

Tim and Pamela belong to lower-class families. Life is hard for them and it is a struggle to survive.

Of children of lower class families, those whose who were lucky enough to go to school, usually had to leave at an early age. Children had to start working to help earn money for their family. These families had difficult times affording clothing, food, and often dealt with illnesses, such as ringworm. Children from these families were often exploited during the Eighteenth Century. Children went to work in factories, mills, and mines. A Lancashire Mill utilized child labour heavily. The children were extremely young, only between the ages of five and seven years old. The children worked for at least fourteen hours a day, sometimes up to eighteen. ^11b In some of these factories, the kids starved and were infested with lice.

Lower class children might live in a one-room shack or cottage, and would sometimes steal food just to have something to eat. Children who lived on farms often spent the long hours of the day in the fields. They looked forward to the cold of the winter, because with less daylight then, there was less time they would be expected to work outside. With such a hard life, these children had little time for leisure or play.




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