JF Ptak Science Books Quick Post
All of the photographic material below comes from the U.S. Library of Congress website for its prints and photographs division, and is a very small sample of what is offered from its online holdings of Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information (FSA and OWI) photographs. It is not ancient history–most of the images are 75 years old or so, a part of our near-past which still shadows our near-future.
“Photographers working for the Farm Security Administration Historical Section (later transferred to the Office of War Information) were encouraged to document continuity and change in many aspects of life in America during the years the unit was in operation. They were particularly encouraged to photograph billboards and signs as one indicator of such developments. Although no documentation has been found to indicate that photographers were explicitly encouraged to photograph racial discrimination signs, the collection includes a significant number of this type of image, which is rarely found in other Prints and Photographs Division collections.”
On of the great innovations in a sea of great things accomplished during the Franklin Roosevelt administrations was the formation of the FSA, a division of the government established to help farmers through the devastating Dust Bowl and Great Depression. A subset of the FSA was a photographic unit which was set up to document the progress made by the FSA (and provide, I am sure, for some much-needed good news, a hearts-and-minds campaign). This division was headed by Roy Emerson Stryker, who wound up hiring a collection of dream-team photographers unlike any ever assembled for a single purpose. Esther Bubley, Marjory Collins, Mary Post Wolcott, Arthur Rothstein, Walker Evans, Russell Lee, Jack Delano, Gordon Parks, Charlotte Brooks, John Vachon, Carl Mydans, Dorothea Lange and Ben Shahn were sent out all across the country and wound up with the greatest and most beautiful photographic history ever assembled. There were about 77,000 images made, and I recall reading (somewhere) that the total budget for the Stryker group for the years 1936-19421 was about $100,000, meaning that each completed image cost just over a dollar apiece.
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1) Bethlehem-Fairield shipyards, Baltimore, Maryland.
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| 2) Memphis, Tennessee. October 1939. Marion Post Wolcott, photographer. “Secondhand clothing stores and pawn shop on Beale Street.” [Sign: “Hotel Clark, The Best Service for Colored Only.”] Location: E-2185 Reproduction Number: LC-USF33-30637-M3 [view catalog record] |
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3) Durham, North Carolina. May 1940. |
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| 4) Durham, North Carolina. May 1940. Jack Delano, photographer. “At the bus station.” Location: E-5153 Reproduction Number: LC-USF33-20522-M2 [view catalog record]
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