Child labor Reform Photographs

Examine the eight photographs taken by photographer Lewis W. Hine around the turn of the century.

For each photograph consider the following questions: (Copy the following and post it to your blog. Title: Child Labor Reform Photographs Labels: Child_Labor, Progressive_Era )


Objective Assessment


As you view each photograph take note about what you see. (note people, background, objects) Pretend you were describing the image to someone who could not see it. Try to avoid making judgments.

Where are these children? List any clues relating to their surroundings.
Describe any tools or objects you see.
Describe their clothing. What do their clothes reveal about their work?

Subjective Assessment


What questions do you have about each of these photographs?
Based on your observations, list three things you might infer about the lives of these children. (Be sure to consider Hine's notes about the photographs when considering this.


Photograph A
A girl in a tattered dress is standing beside a window and a long line of sewing machines in a factory. Why can't the girl remember her age? What does Hine mean "Runs 4 sides-48 cents a day."? If she can't remember her age she must not go to school. if she is 51 inches high she is probabley between 7-10 years old. Because her dress is so wrinkled; she probabley works very long.

Photograph B
The girls are standing outside of a building. Their hair is unkempt, and some of the girls' hair has straw in it. Why is there straw in their hair? Why is the girl in the middle so angry? Why is the girl on the far right smiling? From the photograph I can infer that the building behind the girls is a factory, and the factory processes hay. because their hair is up, it probabley means they work with machines and they don't want there hair to be caught.

Photograph C
The girl is in a room full of sewing machines. Her dress is dirty and wrinkled, and she has no shoes. What does "happened in" mean? Why did the overseer of the factory allow Hine in? What does this girl do? Because the girl is young I can infer that she does not get payed a lot of money. Also, because her dress is dirty, she might work fixing the machines.
Photograph D
The boy is standing next to a street lamp on a street corner with newspapers. He is very small.
Why is he so small? Why does it look like he has no hair? He is probabley small because he is malnurited. He is lucky enough to have shoes.
Photograph E
Breaker Boys are in a building on rows stacked on top of eachother. The coal dust is very dense. Slave-drivers stand next to them with sticks to poke them with. Why is one row on top of the next? Why don't they open the windows? From the amount of dust in that room, all of those boys will die an early death. From the way they are sitting they must have sore backs all the time.
Photograph F
The room is dark and is filled with devices and machines. One boy's shirt is ripped, maybe he got it caught on the end of a pipe. Why are there so many pipes? Why is the room so cramped? Why does the boy on the far left have a fedora? Like the coal workers, I bet there is a lot of dust in that room that could get in your lungs.
Photograph G
The room is long with exposed rafters and a pit in the center. It is hard to tell with what the shuckers are shiucking with. Why is there a hole in the center of the building? Why is a little girl tstanding over the pit? Are the babies working? It seems as though the shuckers are mostly children and women. They wages are probabley low because they aren't men.
Photograph H
There is a nice looking brick building. All the girls haveshauls over their heads, and all the boys have hats on. Why do they all have head coverings? Why is there an old man at the far right of the photo? These children must not go to school because they would be too tired. They are probabley tired all the time because their Circadian rythms are out of wack.