You may be surprised to learn that the Minneapolis school board had a “committee on chairs” in 1934. You may be even more surprised to learn that the Minneapolis Star sent a reporter to cover a meeting of the committee on chairs. Unfortunately, the reporter failed to mention which chair was eventually selected — or who chaired the committee.

Strong Man Act
Crumples Chairs
At School Test

The school board’s committee on chairs met Wednesday at the office of George F. Womrath, business superintendent of city schools.

It met to test chairs. There were six different makes on exhibit. Representatives of chair companies were present.

Lynn Thompson, committee member, declared one type of chair was too weak.

“See.” He put all his weight on one corner of the chair. A leg gave under the strain. “That’s a weak chair.”

“Why,” said Walter E. Johnson, second committee member, “you can do that with any chair.”

He seized a second make with a wrestler’s grip. The second chair gave up the ghost.

As the two were about to “test” additional chairs, representatives of chair companies protested.

“After all,” they said, “you’re buying these chairs for the schools and not for a strong man act.”

Did the committee on chairs test other classroom furniture? The desks looked pretty sturdy in this Minneapolis grade school in 1937. (Photo courtesy mnhs.org)

This entry was posted on Friday, February 20th, 2009 at 12:29 am and is filed under Main, Weird. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.