Schoolboys' threepenny insurance policy against caning

 

Precocious business enterprise has reached a climax at Manchester Grammar School, England, where, we read, some of the boys have started a system of insurance against the cane. The holder of a coupon is entitled to threepence for every caning.

One would like to know more about the details of this business, which seems prima facie to be beset with difficulties.

Is any preliminary inquiry held to consider whether a boy is a ‘good life,’ so to speak?

A young reprobate, hardened alike in sin and skin, might drive the whole company into bankruptcy in a week or two by deliberately running up heavy claims against it when pocket-money was short.

On the other hand, the model boy, who would be a desirable insurer – since he would pay and never have occasion to put in a claim – would not join.

Is there a ‘suicide clause,” ruling out any boy who has wilfully played for his threepence?

On the whole perhaps schoolboys can be trusted to settle these matters very efficiently.

There would probably be a sharp and effective code of lynch law for any coupon holder who deliberately tried to make a good thing out of the company.

As published in The Pall Mall Gazette (London), 25 April 1907.

 

Picture credit: Kernled

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