I was curious about who took the time to document this scene of apparent impoverishment, and tracked down the following on the photographer, Russell Lee, 1903-1986.
Lee grew up in Ottawa, Illinois and went to the Culver Military Academy in Culver, Indiana. He earned a degree in chemical engineering from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He gave up a position as a chemist to become a painter and used photography as a precursor to his painting, but soon became interested in photography as media. His earliest subjects were Pennsylvanian bootleg mining and the Father Divine cult.
In the fall of 1936, during the Great Depression, Lee was hired for the federally sponsored Farm Security Administration (FSA) photographic documentation project of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration. He joined a team assembled under Roy Stryker, along with Dorothea Lange, Arthur Rothstein and Walker Evans.
Lee created some of the iconic images produced by the FSA, including photographic studies of San Augustine, Texas in 1939, and Pie Town, New Mexico in 1940. Over the spring and summer of 1942, Lee was one of several government photographers to document the eviction of Japanese Americans from the West Coast, producing over 600 images of families waiting to be removed and their later life in various detention facilities.
After the FSA was defunded in 1943, Lee served in the Air Transport Command (ATC). During this period, he took photographs of all the airfield approaches used by the ATC to supply the Armed Forces in World War II. In 1946 and 1947, he worked for the United States Department of the Interior (DOI), helping the agency compile a medical survey in communities involved in mining bituminous coal. He created over 4,000 photographs of miners and their working conditions in coal mines. In 1946, Lee completed a series of photos focused on a Pentecostal Church of God in a Kentucky coal camp.
While completing the DOI work, Lee also continued to work under Stryker. He produced public relations photographs for Standard Oil of New Jersey. In 1947 Lee moved to Austin, Texas, and continued photography. In 1965 he became the first instructor of photography at the University of Texas there.
I’m old enough to have watched some famous people on t.v. who grew up in those times. It’s kind of crazy thinking of a guy like Redd Foxx, who became rich and famous when things finally started opening up for black entertainers. He grew up in St. Louis back then. it’s astounding to think of him going from that to the Hollywood Hills and a massive rich-guy cocaine habit and hanging out with Dean Martin.
Its worth remembering that the US was in the throes of the Great Depression literally up to the entry into WW2. Hence why WW2, US entry in Dec 1941-1942– to 1945, is kind of the pre-modern and modern dividing line in American history. Pre-War US and post-War US, because its basically like two different countries, socioeconomically and in day to day life, how transformed the US was. Things like antibiotics became common, plastics became common, shoes on feet even in dire poverty became common. Electricity nationwide became common. Not to mention attention to civil rights and racial integration.
This is why you’ll see in older homes and apartments a thing that looks like a painted over paper plate in the kitchens of older homes. Stoves no longer need to connect to a chimney and those are metal covers.
This picture reminds me of an exhibit of pictures I recently saw of coal miners and where they lived and worked. The living conditions seemed pretty brutal.
not even a hundred years ago. man, kitchens have changed a lot
You know that gravy was bomb.
Everything Cracker Barrel wants to be
I was curious about who took the time to document this scene of apparent impoverishment, and tracked down the following on the photographer, Russell Lee, 1903-1986.
Lee grew up in Ottawa, Illinois and went to the Culver Military Academy in Culver, Indiana. He earned a degree in chemical engineering from Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He gave up a position as a chemist to become a painter and used photography as a precursor to his painting, but soon became interested in photography as media. His earliest subjects were Pennsylvanian bootleg mining and the Father Divine cult.
In the fall of 1936, during the Great Depression, Lee was hired for the federally sponsored Farm Security Administration (FSA) photographic documentation project of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration. He joined a team assembled under Roy Stryker, along with Dorothea Lange, Arthur Rothstein and Walker Evans.
Lee created some of the iconic images produced by the FSA, including photographic studies of San Augustine, Texas in 1939, and Pie Town, New Mexico in 1940. Over the spring and summer of 1942, Lee was one of several government photographers to document the eviction of Japanese Americans from the West Coast, producing over 600 images of families waiting to be removed and their later life in various detention facilities.
After the FSA was defunded in 1943, Lee served in the Air Transport Command (ATC). During this period, he took photographs of all the airfield approaches used by the ATC to supply the Armed Forces in World War II. In 1946 and 1947, he worked for the United States Department of the Interior (DOI), helping the agency compile a medical survey in communities involved in mining bituminous coal. He created over 4,000 photographs of miners and their working conditions in coal mines. In 1946, Lee completed a series of photos focused on a Pentecostal Church of God in a Kentucky coal camp.
While completing the DOI work, Lee also continued to work under Stryker. He produced public relations photographs for Standard Oil of New Jersey. In 1947 Lee moved to Austin, Texas, and continued photography. In 1965 he became the first instructor of photography at the University of Texas there.
Great pic!
I’m old enough to have watched some famous people on t.v. who grew up in those times. It’s kind of crazy thinking of a guy like Redd Foxx, who became rich and famous when things finally started opening up for black entertainers. He grew up in St. Louis back then. it’s astounding to think of him going from that to the Hollywood Hills and a massive rich-guy cocaine habit and hanging out with Dean Martin.
Its worth remembering that the US was in the throes of the Great Depression literally up to the entry into WW2. Hence why WW2, US entry in Dec 1941-1942– to 1945, is kind of the pre-modern and modern dividing line in American history. Pre-War US and post-War US, because its basically like two different countries, socioeconomically and in day to day life, how transformed the US was. Things like antibiotics became common, plastics became common, shoes on feet even in dire poverty became common. Electricity nationwide became common. Not to mention attention to civil rights and racial integration.
This is why you’ll see in older homes and apartments a thing that looks like a painted over paper plate in the kitchens of older homes. Stoves no longer need to connect to a chimney and those are metal covers.
Looks hot in there and the stove was moved from the right wall at some point.
86 years later and I’m choking on the dust in this picture 😷
I’d chug myself into a coronary with country gravy.
And biscuits.
And fried chicken.
And stovetop beans.
And wilted creamed collards.
And cobblers.
God, I miss southern food.
I just bet it was delicious also…
My God, can you imagine the miserable heat in that picture?
I can taste the food from here.
Poor girl needs Secret.
Is this what they mean by make America great again?
Gravy Baby.
I bet it was awesome.
I saw people still cooking like this in Mississippi in the early 1970’s.
I bet that gravy was amazing!
I have to wonder if this is from one of the sharecropper camps during the rebellion. My mom was born in one (1939).
You better like my gravy white boy or I be slapping you silly.
Isn’t that Aunt Jemima maple syrup?
“I’ll take pictures you can smell for 500 Alex”
This picture reminds me of an exhibit of pictures I recently saw of coal miners and where they lived and worked. The living conditions seemed pretty brutal.
I bet it was good.
Hard life
Gravy? For what?