Lucien Durrieux

Getting around

Train vendors moved between carriages via footboards

Traveling by train was often an adventure, with vendors known as swallows selling goods like perfume and cognac while moving between compartments via exterior footboards.

At the table

The Ordinary Worker Lunch: Ordinaire

A typical working-class lunch, known as an ordinaire, consisted of boiled beef, broth, vegetables, cheese, bread, and wine for about one franc. Many workers saved money by eating only the broth and vegetables at lunch and taking the beef home for dinner.

What people wore

Quimper workers kept festal clothes apart

In Quimper (Brittany), rural workers could keep their everyday work clothes separate from festival clothing, sometimes commissioned for weddings. This made clothing a visible marker of identity and social position.

Music

Instruments of the Paris Bal Musette

In the early 20th century, the cabrette, a small bagpipe, was the signature instrument of Parisian bal musette, but it was gradually joined or replaced by the accordion introduced by Italian immigrants.

Daily life

Compulsory schooling and literacy

By 1900, free and compulsory primary education created a new generation of literate children who often acted as cultural mediators for their illiterate parents and grandparents.