Teaching and family: either or both? Work and family among women primary school teachers in northern Sweden, c. 1860–1937

Figures & data

Figure 1. Individuals with teacher notation divided by gender, birth cohort and among qualified teachers - their level of teacher training.

Sources: Beskow 1885, Borgh 1889, Censuses 1870–1930, Dahlberg 1871, Folkskolans lärarekår i Luleå stift 1937, Francke 1905, Francke 1915, Gustafsson 1904, Göransson 1922, Lidell 1896, Linder 1945, Lundmark 1937, Parish records for Skellefteå 1791–1950. See further information in Appendix - Figure A and Table 1.

Table 1. Overview of all individuals with a teaching notation in the compiled data presented by birth cohort, teacher group, and notation of children. Qualified primary school teachers born 1860–1914 included in the collective biographies are displayed in bold. Excluded teachers, i.e. unqualified teachers, teachers born prior 1860 and one male junior school teacher (b. 1880), are displayed in italic.

Teacher group	Link between parenthood and teaching	−1859	1860–1879	1880–1899	1900–1914
Women junior schoolteachers (JST) N= 355	No documented child/children	9	50	74	34
	Teaching record after parenthood	2	14	41	15
	No record of teaching upon parenthood	11	41	56	8
	Total – Women JST in each cohort:	22	105	171	57
Women elementary schoolteachers (EST) N= 88	No documented child/children	4	24	11	13
	Teaching record after parenthood	0	1	6	12
	No record of teaching upon parenthood	1	6	5	5
	Total – Women EST in each cohort:	5	31	22	30
Male elementary schoolteachers (EST) N= 70	No documented child/children	0	2	7	6
	Teaching record after parenthood	8	3	26	16
	No record of teaching upon parenthood	1	0	1	0
	Total – Male EST in each cohort:	9	5	34	22
Unqualified teachers (N=79): Total (women of total):		56 (35)	20 (20)	3 (3)	N/A
Male junior school teachers (N=3):		2	1	N/A	N/A
Total number of teachers by birth cohort (N=595):		94	162	230	109
Total number of qualified teachers (N=516)		38	142	227	109
Qualified teachers included in the collective biographies (N=477):		N/A	141	227	109

Sources: Beskow 1885, Borgh 1889, Censuses 1870–1930, Dahlberg 1871, Folkskolans lärarekår i Luleå stift 1937, Francke 1905, Francke 1915, Gustafsson 1904, Göransson 1922, Lidell 1896, Linder 1945, Lundmark 1937, Parish records for Skellefteå 1791–1950.

Figure 2. Parenthood and teaching among three groups of qualified school teachers (ST), presented as percent per birth cohort (N= 513). Actual numbers are presented in appendix, see Table 1.

Sources: Beskow 1885, Borgh 1889, Censuses 1870–1930, Dahlberg 1871, Folkskolans lärarekår i Luleå stift 1937, Francke 1905, Francke 1915, Gustafsson 1904, Göransson 1922, Lidell 1896, Linder 1945, Lundmark 1937, Parish records for Skellefteå 1791–1950. For further information, see Figure A and Table 1, both in Appendix.

Figure 3. Class of 1907, junior school teacher training college in skellefteå. Augusta saedén (front row, fifth from right) was the first headmistress when the teacher college became permanent in 1892 and continued as such retirement until retirement in 1917. Saedén was succeeded by ida Nordsvan (front row, sixth from right) whose term as headmistress ended when the college closed in 1929. A majority of the future teachers were born in either 1887 or 1888. The only man in the picture is one of the few men that entered junior school teacher training.

Source: Skellefteå museum, ID: C 12,015

Göransson, Edvard. Svensk folkskolematrikel år 1922, del I–III. Stockholm: P. A. Norstedt & Söner, 1922.

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Linder, Ruth. Sveriges småskollärarinnor i ord och bild. Vol. III. Uppsala: Biografiskt galleri, 1945.

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Lundmark, Rudolf. “Lärare i Skellefteå sedan 1842.” Skolstyrelsen, Skellefteå landsförsamling Skellefteå kommunarkiv, Skellefteå (1937).

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