Various Customisation's Book Bag Buddies Clip-On Shoulder Strap

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Do not be deterred by its seemingly narrow focus. Here the long subtitle gives a clue to a wider range of concerns. Indeed, the very first picture in the book is not of a Canadian strap at all, but has the caption "In 1941, a worker sprays a coat of varnish on a wooden punishment paddle", and shows industrial-scale production of school paddles under way, presumably in the USA -- a fascinating and revealing photo that was entirely new to me. As the author notes in his Preface:

Clasps of type A.4.1 are rare, and some (such as NLM-0A25E8) may be incomplete examples of type A.4.2. There are a few examples which clearly never had the pierced lug, though, and these include SF3887. Five book clasps of Howsam type A.4.2. Left, top to bottom: SUR-6DA691 and NMS-280856. Centre left: BERK-2C8241. Centre: BH-87AE0C. Centre right, top: SF-12E8D6. Below is a type A.4.1 which may in fact be an incomplete type A.4.2 ( NLM-0A25E8). Right, a definite example of a type A.4.1 ( SF3887). Mounts from anywhere on the cover can be of many shapes, but triangular, square and circular are commonest. Tabs and flanges can be pierced to take rivets; alternatively, a single rivet is occasionally found through the centre. Occasionally a central hole has been caused by wear ( DENO-42532D), and sometimes a central hole is decorative ( SWYOR-A0F432). For each kind of strap listed and pictured, the dimensions are given, years of production, and estimated value at auction or from dealers if you want to buy a genuine used one today. It is evident that, since school corporal punishment was declared illegal in most of the countries covered, such of these items as remain in existence fetch in many cases a high price from collectors: some rare examples run to many hundreds of dollars. At the Duke of York's School a boy called William Tart received no fewer than 106 strokes of the cane in the course of 1888. However, the author assures us that "the majority thrived on the discipline they received". As the group is quite heterogeneous, including different shapes and decoration, the date-range of Type A.10 is wide. More precise dates may be possible on the basis of the decoration. One-piece book clasps which can perhaps be allocated to Howsam type A.10. Top row, left to right: SWYOR-D9A074, SUSS-0D63D3, WMID5232. Second row, left to right: HAMP2800, GLO-8F1C22, GLO-5B1D88. Bottom row, left to right: BERK-ED9750, LVPL-CDD0D0.The plate to which a type A.5 clasp is hinged is known as an anchor plate. Anchor plates are not normally distinguishable from catchplates, which form the next type, A.6. Paper lies flatter than parchment, so book clasps to keep the book shut would not be so necessary; and paper books often had pasteboard (layered paper) covers, which did not hold nails and rivets to fix clasps and mounts nearly as well as the earlier wooden covers. Book clasp’ is not included in the mda thesaurus, so we use BOOK FITTING instead, with ‘clasp’ in the classification field. PAS object classifications and sub-classifications to be used

The author shows that in the early days a variety of different punishment implements arrived in the New World from the Old; in particular the cane or switch from England and Germany, and the leather strap from Scotland and Ireland. (France, oddly enough considering Canada's history, does not seem to feature.) It was only later that the rubber/canvas strap -- unique to Canada, as far as I know -- came to be the standard instrument of choice in Canadian government schools, although canes, leather straps and US-style paddles were all used in certain private ones. This trend towards standardisation, Mr Hoff shows, was the product of various unrelated influences between 1850 and 1900, and echoed similar trends (though with different results) in the UK and Australia. The PODD system offers a complete language approach through carefully organized symbol sets. Because the PODD system promotes a language immersion model, there is no pressure on our language-learners reproducing specific words or patterns at a specific rate. The primary requirement is that adults are modeling PODD for our language-learners. Type A.3 is the commonest type of medieval book clasp. It is made from a long thin strip of copper-alloy sheet, with one end flared and shaped and the other end hooked. The metal appears brassy and has often corroded to a reddish brown. They are often decorated with longitudinal grooves, circular perforations, stamps and ring-and-dot motifs. A selection of book clasps of type A.3. Left to right: FAKL-9EC55F, SWYOR-A411C7, KENT-E363E8, ESS-C923A9, WILT-CB74F6.

It is simply impossible to do justice to this subject by looking at it in complete isolation. It is inseparably woven with other practices in society. Therefore, we must also examine aspects of judicial CP, and parental CP, to understand the dynamics behind school CP. In the same way, the experience of other countries is highlighted to demonstrate why this necessarily influenced the Canadian one."

Although these appear to be cast in one piece, it is possible that some examples were made in several pieces, carefully soldered together. Corner mounts are Howsam type B.4. They can be divided into square mounts with one or two down-turned edges (type B.4.1) and L-shaped flat mounts (type B.4.2). A third type, L-shaped with down-turned edges (type B.4.3), is not yet represented on the PAS database. There are two slightly later versions excavated in Norwich, made from square sheet bodies decorated with repoussé ornament, folded in half and with a small hole cut at the centre of the fold to take the separate wire loop. Their ornament dates them to the 15th or 16th centuries (Margeson 1993, nos. 245 and 246). Parallels on the PAS database include LON-7B9423, NMS-31E187 and NMS-4454E7. ‘Bookmarks’ of Howsam type B.7. Left to right, PUBLIC-312387, SF-420DC0, NMS-31E187, LON-7B9423. The two on the left are perhaps 14th- or 15th-century; the two on the right are perhaps 15th- or 16th-century.

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There are many problems in constructing a chronology of book fittings. Books are long-lived objects, but they do get discarded and replaced, and it seems that this increased in the 14th and 15th centuries ( Howsam 2016, 354-356). In addition, many books were curated by ecclesiastical institutions and discarded en masse at the Dissolution in the 16th century. The date of deposition of book fittings may therefore be centuries later than their date of manufacture ( Howsam 2016, 24-26).