Recently came across a letter, written by my grandmother as a young woman in the 1920s. Her handwriting was simply beautiful.
She wasn’t a particularly highly educated person, and I imagine many people wrote similarly well, because it was a focus of basic education 100 years ago.
Perhaps its simply not a necessary skill now.
Penmanship is no longer taught in few, if any, schools.
Recently came across a letter, written by my grandmother as a young woman in the 1920s. Her handwriting was simply beautiful.
She wasn’t a particularly highly educated person, and I imagine many people wrote similarly well, because it was a focus of basic education 100 years ago.
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I noticed the same in reading letters from a field soldier written during the Civil War. The writing was cursive and extremely even. The prose itself was clear, insightful and grammatically correct.
Learning how to write script develops the brain, as well as small finger skills; both very necessary!
And the stupid idea that nobody will need to know how to write any more, goes back over a 100 years and was first proposed by that moronic lefty, John Dewey, who said that because typewriters were being used at work, instead of people writing things by hand.
Penmanship was once a subject as important as math, geography, spelling, etc., in all grammar schools...until lately. But it should be still taught and practiced, as it once was.
“”Recently came across a letter, written by my grandmother as a young woman in the 1920s. Her handwriting was simply beautiful.””
I never knew any of my grandparents but an aunt sent me the original piece of paper listing family members written by her mother and like you say, it was amazingly beautiful - recapping the ancestry of the folks from Bristol, England..We did have penmanship in school and anyone as old as I am today still writes beautifully but there was something special about the old handwritten documents - they didn’t have modern pens..
Writing as such may not be a 'necessary skill', but fine motor control of the fingers absolutely IS a necessary capability. Writing, drawing, and playing musical instruments develop fine motor control.
I remember when Penmanship was taught in schools. Others also taught the art of calligraphy.
Also Cursive.
When I was a grade schooler in the 1950’s hand writing was taught as part of the curriculum.