Shows that despite moves during the 1840s in England to use teacher training to raise working-class members into the lower levels of white-collar society, elementary teaching was dominated by the lower middle class. Provides evidence from a sample of pupil teachers in Birmingham during the years 1850 through 1900. (DSK)

"Illiterates" are those who have not learned to write in any language. This is the definition on which American and most foreign statistics of illiteracy are based, because the percentage of those who can read but can not write is so small that it may be ignored. The test of writing one's name and ordinary words is simple, easily…