*sigh*

[fenderlove]

I had a rather off night last night what with realizing that I have completely misplaced a fanfic file... Still can't find it nor any of my notes on paper about it... and, apparently, I never saved any of my research links, and now that I've gone looking for them again, I can't find any of them. Christ on an effin' bike.

So, Victorian-lovin' friends of mine, does anyone know of any material about common occupations for middle class/upper middle class Victorians in London (or any of Middlesex's surrounding counties) between 1800-1880? Yes, most upwardly mobile Victorians didn't want to do any kind of labour, but some did. I'm specifically looking for educators (of the fancier public variety for younger children and college-level professors-- their credentials, their own educational background, social standing, etc.) and bankers. The only resources I have at my deposal at the moment are Tom Brown's School Days and Mary Poppins, and I've exhausted VictorianLondon.org and Victoriana.com.

Comments

[velvetwhip.livejournal.com]

Have you tried this link? http://www.victorianweb.org/history/sochistov.html


Gabrielle

[gillo]

Why not have a look at a few specific names? Ruskin, the various Butlers, the major commercial houses like Liberty. For bankers, look up people like the Coutts family.

College-level professors in that specific period were mostly clergymen, except for those at UCL, which was founded in the early 1830s as a "godless institution on Gower Street". You could look up individuals like Lewis Carroll or any of the vast Darwin/Galton/Wedgwood/Raverat/Huxley clan who pretty much dominated Cambridge intellectual life of the period and intermarried most confusingly.

You could also explore fictional characters and families - Dickens has a fair number of the right sort of family, if rather exaggerated; Thackeray has some and there are a few in the non-Barsetshire Trollopes. You could reasonably assume a lot of younger sons of country gentry made their way to London, finding "openings" in the big commercial houses which dealt in the ever-growing trade within and outside the Empire.

Hope this is of use. If you want anything more narrowed-down, give me a yell. It's one of the periods I seem to have specialised in.