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Last updated 27/11/2025

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Sloyd: Educational Manual Training by Everett Schwartz, 1893
 
'Sloyd: Educational Manual Training' by Everett Schwartz was published by the Educational Publishing Company in Boston in 1893. It contains chapters on Paper Work and Cardboard Work. Apart from the material used, the difference between Paper Work and Cardboard Work designs is that the Paper Work designs are sewn together while the Cardboard Work designs are glued together using tabs. Both can be considered to be types of Cardboard Modelling.

The word 'Sloyd' is only used in the title of the book, in page and chapter headings throughout the work, and in the Contents (where it is used as an alternative for wood-working). It is not used by the author in the Preface or elsewhere in the text. This suggests that, to the author, the description 'Sloyd' was only appropriate to wood-working and that the word 'Sloyd' may have been added to the title and chapter headings by the publisher, presumably because it was believed it would make the work more attractive to potential purchasers.

However, the content of Chapter 3: 'Advanced Cardboard-Modelling. Useful Articles' suggests that the principle of Sloyd proper, that the products of manual training should be useful articles, was influencing the way in which Cardboard Work was taught at this date.

A full copy of the work can be accessed here. This copy is missing a title page but title pages from other publications from the Educational Publishing Company of similar date show that it was based in Boston.

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Analysis

This Analysis only shows selected items from the work.

1. Paper Work

This chapter begins with two simple designs made from squares:

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The Cut and Fold Windmill

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The remaining designs are made from irregular templates which need to be cut-out, folded and sewn together.

One of the simplest examples is hown here.

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2. Card-Board Work

The designs in this section are standard Cardboard Modelling designs of polyhedra, provided with tabs and held together by glue.

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3, Advanced Card-Board Work. Useful Articles.

Only some of the designs in this chapter are made from folded templates.

Although called 'useful articles' many are simply polyhedra reinterpreted as 'paperweights' etc.

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