Timeline

(b) Health and leisure activities.

There were serious health problems in the factory towns such as Manchester.
Given the poor conditions workers lived in and the terrible sanitation disease was a constant danger. Water was not safe to drink.
Some of the most dreaded diseases were typhoid, cholera and typhus. Consumption or TB was also a very common disease.
After 1850 British cities built sewers and improved sanitation. This reduced the effects of diseases such as cholera and typhoid.
Although working hours were long, workers enjoyed many different forms of entertainment. Drinking was very popular. There was no age limit for drinking and pubs opened for most of the day.
Other pastimes included bull baiting, cock-fighting and prize-fighting. Gambling on the outcome of these sports was very common.
Later on in the century going to football matches on a Saturday afternoon became a popular pastime.

(c) Education.

Education for poor children was very rare around 1800. Most factory owners saw no reason to pay to educate their child labourers.
However this was not always the case and some factory owners such as Robert Owen set up schools for children.
The different churches and some wealthy men set up schools to educate young children.
Ragged schools were set up supported by wealthy people throughout Britain that provided free education for poor children. Over 200 had been established by 1850.
The Factory Acts limited the hours that children could work and stated that they must attend school for a certain period of time per day.
In 1870 the British government introduced free primary education for all children.
Secondary education was rare! Rich children went to expensive private schools called public schools.
A lot of resistance to education reforms came from poor families themselves who wanted their children to work in factories rather than lose money while their children were educated.