Robert Raikes and How We Got Sunday School
This is an electronic version of our Glimpses for Kids children's worship bulletin inserts.
These are designed to present Christian biographies for Children's church, educational or worship ministries.  Robert
Raikes.
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Robert knelt beside his father's grave after
the funeral. Where would he go now? What would he do with his life? He'd
always worked beside his father in the printing shop. But now those days
were gone forever.
He mopped his teary face with a handkerchief and stood to his feet. Leaving
the graveyard, Robert walked toward the printing shop that now belonged
to him. He and his father had spent the last several years there, working
on Gloucester, England's newspaper, the Gloucester Journal.
Robert opened the creaky front door of the shop and slowly walked inside.
The familiar smell of ink and machinery greeted him. Robert picked up
the last copy of the Gloucester Journal published by his father
that year, in 1757. "I'll make you proud, Father," he said aloud.
"With God's help, I'll keep your Gloucester Journal alive."
The days passed and Robert worked hard. He made the newspaper larger,
improved its layout, and hired new writers. Soon even more people wanted
to read the Gloucester Journal!
On his days off, Robert often visited prisoners in Gloucester. There
he found the castoffs of society living in the most appalling circumstances.
Most of them were sick or even dying from overwork. They lived in crowded,
filthy spaces with almost no food. Even children were sometimes imprisoned
along with the worst criminals. Robert felt sad to see these sick and
starving prisoners. But what could one person do to ease the pain of so
many? He decided to write about the terrible prisons in his newspaper.
The White Slaves of England
One evening he walked down St. Catherine's Street to look for his gardener.
Suddenly, he saw a group of ragged children. They looked just as poor
and overworked as the prisoners he visited. A little boy in a tattered
blue shirt swore as he tackled another boy half his size.
"Git your hands offa me!" the little boy yelled as the two
of them wrestled on the cobblestones. Soon a crowd of children gathered
around, noisily cheering.
"Hey, stop fighting!" Robert shouted at them as he pulled the
two boys apart. "Go home, all of you."
As the children walked away, Robert asked the gardener's wife, "Who
are these children?"
"Ah, pay no mind to them," she answered. "Everyone calls
them the white slaves of England."
"Slaves?" asked Robert.
"They work 12 hours a day or longer in the mills and sweatshops,"
the woman answered. "Most of their parents are in prison or dead."
Robert cringed. He knew that if his father had died when he was little,
he could have been one of these poor children. "When do they go to
school?" he asked.
"School? They don't go to school. They have to work to live."
she answered.
And Sundays are the worst. It's their only day off and they run around
like wild animals!"
Sunday Schools Started
Robert knew that the future was grim for these children who had to work
all the time with no hope of an education. Worse yet, with no one to teach
them the good news of the Gospel or how to live God's way, they were likely
to end up cold, sick and starving in the dreadful prisons. An idea began
to form in Robert's mind which he shared with his friend, Reverend Thomas
Stock.
 "Let's
start a Sunday school!" said Robert.
"School on Sunday?" asked Thomas.
"Yes, school on Sunday!" answered Robert. "We'll teach
them to read and write part of the day and teach them the Bible for the
rest of the day."
"It's a great idea!" said Thomas.
Robert waited expectantly the first Sunday for the children to come
to the new school, but only a few came.
"Marcy, why don't more of the children come to Sunday school?"
he asked the little red-haired girl with freckles.
Marcy looked down. "Cuz our clothes ain't no good," she answered.
"Now I understand," answered Robert. "Well, you tell your
friends that all they need is a clean face and combed hair, okay, Marcy?"
Marcy smiled. "You're nice."
Robert squatted down beside her. "I'll tell you what, Marcy, I
think you're nice, too. Here's a penny for coming to class today. If you
work very hard and learn your lessons, you'll get a special reward."
"Really?" asked Marcy, her sparkling eyes fixed on the candy
Robert held in his hand. "I'll do my very best!"
Learn what happened when Robert Raikes did his
best in part 2 of this "Glimpses for Kids" children's worship
bulletin insert.
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