Ragged School Museum
The Victorians weren’t very nice people. Although in 1883, as many as 60,000 families lived in a single room, church-run schools still charged a penny a week and had a dress code, and the many kids who couldn’t manage ended up on the street. Thomas Bernardo was headed for missionary work abroad when he realized East London kids needed him more than foreigners did; he took in the “ragged” children who couldn’t even muster shoes, gave them an education, and made them his “home kids,” feeding and nurturing them. From 1877 (when one in four children who lived around here died) to 1908, he used this canalside warehouse as a school—playground in the basement, classrooms (now re-created) up top—and he worked to help the most desperate kids emigrate for better lives. One in 11 Canadians can trace their ancestry to “home” children who went to ragged schools like this one. This little museum is like Bernardo’s school: homegrown, rough around the edges, run as a labor of love, and welcoming.
The Victorians weren’t very nice people. Although in 1883, as many as 60,000 families lived in a single room, church-run schools still charged a penny a week and had a dress code, and the many kids who couldn’t manage ended up on the street. Thomas Bernardo was headed for missionary work abroad when he realized East London kids needed him more than foreigners did; he took in the “ragged” children who couldn’t even muster shoes, gave them an education, and made them his “home kids,” feeding and nurturing them. From 1877 (when one in four children who lived around here died) to 1908, he used this canalside warehouse as a school—playground in the basement, classrooms (now re-created) up top—and he worked to help the most desperate kids emigrate for better lives. One in 11 Canadians can trace their ancestry to “home” children who went to ragged schools like this one. This little museum is like Bernardo’s school: homegrown, rough around the edges, run as a labor of love, and welcoming.
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