Of the Beacoms whose literacy was recorded, 77.4% could both read and write, 3% could read but not write, and 19.6% could do neither. Women came out slightly ahead, 81.6% reading and writing against 74.1% of men. Bear in mind these figures include young children; the census itself only counted people aged nine and over when calculating illiteracy, on the grounds that it was unfair to label a child illiterate before they'd had a chance to learn.