What are school supplies these days? Are they pens, pencils and notebooks? Remember 3-ring binders? That's what is on the front page of the Stables back-to-school website page. What is there now is backpacks - we didn't have them when we were children.
The word backpack was coined in the United States in the 1910s. There were version before that - rucksack, knapsack and packsack were used.
While they were a standard part of soldier equipment, we mostly think of backpacks now as part of school equipment.
What to pack in your kids' backpack - water bottle, extra clothes, wet wipes and tissues, healthy snacks, a pencil case, a first aid kit, a map, an emergency contact card.
It looks complicated to me now - as though a child has everything to leave home and not come back, sort of. I certainly wouldn't put all those things in a backpack if I wanted to break the world record on the most number of backpacks filled with school supplies in one hour.
"The most backpacks stuffed with school supplies in one hour is 7,039, and was achieved by BAZIC PRODUCTS (USA) in El Monte, California, USA, on 27 July 2024."
"The same backpacks were used immediately prior to being stuffed at a successful GWR attempt at longest line of backpacks. The filled backpacks were donated to non-profit School on Wheels for distribution to unhoused students in the Los Angeles region."
This stuffing of backpacks in one hour record seems to be popular - Temple University, Brown University, ADRA have all held the record - BAZIC is the most recent record-holder. They must have had a bigger team than the previous record-holders as the record is by a team of unlimited size.
Do you have a backpack? Sixty percent of Americans do.
And there we have it - monks at Butchart Gardens with their backpacks.
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