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The Edwardians 1900-1909
As well as serious money, the rich of this era had the beginnings of a social
conscience. Charity had always been privately administered, often by the Church,
but it generally had strings attached that left many of the needy feeling the
cure was worse than the ailment …
The major change for working women came in the continuing shift from service to
office. The demand for domestic staff from the middle class was greater than
ever, but servants weren’t particularly well treated so many now left domestic
life for good. The telephone, both in the home and office, revolutionised
communications and provided thousands more jobs for operators.
The first of many cinemas opened in London’s Bishopsgate in 1906. Within a
couple of years, moving pictures would be the nation’s most popular
entertainment. Public libraries were established, and as a result, the women’s
fiction market became big business.
Suffragettes frequently ran in to trouble with the police, but this was hardly
the reason for the police’s poor reputation in 1904. Like the regular army,
the police often recruited from the rougher elements of society.