Stanny’s Stues: Margaret Stansfeld and Female Culture at Bedford Physical Training College, 1903-1925
By
Kelvin Street, PhD.
Group photograph of Set II Bedford students (1904-1906), Miss Stansfeld is situated in the middle. Bedford Physical Education Archive. University of Bedfordshire Special Collections. Further reproduction or copying of this image is not permitted without the consent of the University of Bedfordshire Library and BPEOS Association
This history of Bedford Physical Training College and its pioneering founder Margaret Stansfeld is based on an article I had published in the mid-90s and has been updated and enhanced by work I later did for a PhD within the area of the history and sociology of female education.
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I became interested in the college’s history when I looked after the Bedford Physical Education Old Students Archive whilst working at De Montfort University’s Lansdowne Library which was situated amongst the college’s buildings on its original site.
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Working with the association, various initiatives were taken. I arranged for the boardroom to permanently exhibit photographs from the archives going back to the college’s origin in 1903. I also helped plan and produce the photo booklet, Bedford Physical Education: Pictures of College Life, edited by Eileen Rawlings. Various exhibitions of college memorabilia were set up. I later benefited from the decision to offer research grants into physical education and sport history when I was awarded the Alexander Studentship to study and complete a PhD entitled Female Culture in Physical Training Colleges 1885-1918 funded by DMU and the BPEOSA.
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I have taken the opportunity to amalgamate this knowledge to make available on the internet a more detailed history of the early phase of the college’s development than is currently freely available. This highlights the rich female college culture of the time and shows the contribution and experiences of staff and students during this pioneering stage of the development of physical training for women.
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This history contains at its heart the words and recollections of the students who were there at Bedford at the time. I have added around this experience the historical perspectives and interpretations of the time.
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I would like to acknowledge the help of the University of Bedfordshire Library and staff who arranged and provided access to the Bedford college archive and of the BPEOSA who gave permission for publication of a selection of photographs from the era to bring a visual element to the history.
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Kelvin Street, October 2023
Next: Introduction to the development of physical education for women in Victorian and Edwardian Britain
Kelvin Street Middlesbrough