Children of the Depression
By Hilary Austin (Editor); Kathleen Thompson (Editor); Patrick McNaughton (Editor)
(Indiana University Press, Hardcover, 9780253340313, 216pp.)
Publication Date: September 2001
Categories: Children's Studies, United States - 20th Century
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During the Depression, Roy Emerson Stryker, head of the Farm SecurityAdministration Historical Section, hired some of the best photographers in theUnited States -- including Dorothea Lange, Gordon Parks, Walker Evans, Ben Shahn, Marion Post Walcott, John Delano, John Vachon, and Arthur Rothstein -- to record thestate of the country during its direst days. While Stryker made many demands on hisphotographers, he also gave them a great deal of freedom. Asking for sociology, hereceived great art. It is that combination which makes the FSA collection sospecial.
A goal of the FSA photographers was to inspire thecountry to care about the people the New Deal programs were trying to help. Withregard to children, they were masterful. The photographs show us the young of everyethnicity living in conditions we associate today with Third World countries. Behindvirtually every shot taken of a child by these remarkable chroniclers is the dreamof a world in which childhood is a time of play, happiness, and safety. The reality, shown in the photographs assembled in Children of the Depression, reveals thebetrayal of that dream. But the pictures also are a testament to resilience andhope.
Editors Kathleen Thompson and Hilary Mac Austin have chosenimages that represent different regions and ethnic backgrounds. Some pictures maychallenge preconceptions about the Depression era; others will give concrete meaningto the facts and figures that we know about deprivation and hardship. Thompson andAustin use a few of the very familiar FSA photographs, in addition to many picturesthat have seldom or never been published.
More than 100black-and-white images are arranged by category, each chapter depicting a specificelement of the daily lives of children. Although the photographs are the definingfeature of the book, compelling quotes transcribed by social workers of the era areinterspersed throughout.
Children of the Depression will appeal tolovers of great photography. It will also serve as graphic representation for thegenerations that followed of the conditions that formed the values and aspirationsof many of their parents and grandparents.
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