visibility Similar

code Related

All these pick shrimp at the Peerless Oyster Co. I had to take photo while bosses were at dinner as they refused to permit children to be in photos. Out of 60 workers, 15 were apparently under 12 years. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.

All these pick shrimp at the Oyster Co. I had to take photo while bosses were at dinner as they refused to permit the children to be in photos. Out of 60 workers, 15 were apparently under 12 years. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi

All these pick shrimp at the Oyster Co. I had to take photo while bosses were at dinner as they refused to permit the children to be in photos. Out of 60 workers, 15 were apparently under 12 years. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.

Some of the shrimp-pickers in an Oyster Co. The bosses refused to allow the children to be in the photo, so I was compelled to wait until they had gone home to dinner, before I could get this. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.

Sadie Kelly, 11 years old, Picks shrimp for the Peerless Oyster Co. Picked 7 pots yesterday, 5 pots today at 5 cents. Picked last year. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi

All these work in Peerless Oyster Co. Had to get the photo while bosses were at dinner, as they refused to permit children in the photos. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi

All these work in Peerless Oyster Co. Had to get the photo while bosses were at dinner, as they refused to permit children in the photos. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.

Shrimp-pickers in Peerless Oyster Co. Photo taken just as they stood. On other side of the shed, still younger children were working. Out of sixty working (only half were there) I counted fifteen apparently under twelve years old. Some three, four, and five years old were picking too. Parents acknowledged ages and fact that they worked some. Boss said they went to work at 3:00 A.M., and would quit about 3 or 4 P.M. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi

A group of shrimp pickers in Peerless Oyster Co., working during the short noon recess. Many workers, including the children, utilize part of the lunch time this way, when there is a lunch time allowed. In many canneries, they snatch their lunches as best they may while the work goes on and others are getting ahead of them. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi

All these pick shrimp at the Peerless Oyster Co. I had to take photo while bosses were at dinner as they refused to permit children to be in photos. Out of 60 workers, 15 were apparently under 12 years. Location: Bay St. Louis, Mississippi

description

Summary

Title from NCLC caption card.

Attribution to Hine based on provenance.

In album: Canneries.

Hine no. 2040.

Credit line: National Child Labor Committee collection, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.

General information about the National Child Labor Committee collection is available at: loc.gov

Forms part of: National Child Labor Committee collection.

Hine grew up in Oshkosh, Wisconsin. As a young man he had to care for himself, and working at a furniture factory gave him first-hand knowledge of industrial workers' harsh reality. Eight years later he matriculated at the University of Chicago and met Professor Frank A. Manny, whom he followed to New York to teach at the Ethical Culture School and continue his studies at New York University. As a faculty member at the Ethical Culture School Hine was introduced to photography. From 1904 until his death he documented a series of sites and conditions in the USA and Europe. In 1906 he became a photographer and field worker for the National Child Labor Committee (NCLC). Undercover, disguised among other things as a Bible salesman or photographer for post-cards or industry, Hine went into American factories. His research methodology was based on photographic documentation and interviews. Together with the NCLC he worked to place the working conditions of two million American children onto the political agenda. The NCLC later said that Hine's photographs were decisive in the 1938 passage of federal law governing child labor in the United States. In 1918 Hine left the NCLC for the Red Cross and their work in Europe. After a short period as an employee, he returned to the United States and began as an independent photographer. One of Hine's last major projects was the series Men at Work, published as a book in 1932. It is a homage to the worker that built the country, and it documents such things as the construction of the Empire State Building. In 1940 Hine died abruptly after several years of poor income and few commissions. Even though interest in his work was increasing, it was not until after his death that Hine was raised to the stature of one of the great photographers in the history of the medium.

According to the 1900 US Census, a total of 1,752,187 (about 1 in every 6) children between the ages of five and ten were engaged in "gainful occupations" in the United States. The National Child Labor Committee, or NCLC, was a private, non-profit organization that served as a leading proponent for the national child labor reform movement. It headquartered on Broadway in Manhattan, New York. In 1908 the National Child Labor Committee hired Lewis Hine, a teacher and professional photographer trained in sociology, who advocated photography as an educational medium, to document child labor in the American industry. Over the next ten years, Hine would publish thousands of photographs designed to pull at the nation's heartstrings. The NCLC is a rare example of an organization that succeeded in its mission and was no longer needed. After more than a century of fighting child labor, it shut down in 2017.

label_outline

Tags

children cannery workers shrimp industry oyster industry mississippi bay st louis photographic prints lot 7476 national child labor committee collection lewis wickes hine photo peerless oyster co pick shrimp bay st ultra high resolution high resolution lewis w hine library of congress child labor
date_range

Date

01/01/1911
collections

in collections

Lewis W. Hine

Lewis Hine, Library of Congress Collection

Child Labor

National Child Labor Committee collection
place

Location

bay st louis
create

Source

Library of Congress
link

Link

https://www.loc.gov/
copyright

Copyright info

No known restrictions on publication. For information see: "National Child Labor Committee (Lewis Hine photographs)," https://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/res.097.hine

label_outline Explore Peerless Oyster Co, Shrimp Industry, Bay St Louis

Along the bay, Bay St. Louis, Miss.

Eight-year old Jack on a Western Massachusetts farm. He is a type of child who is being overworked in many rural districts. See Hine Report, Rural Child Labor, August, 1915. Location: Western Massachusetts, Massachusetts.

Two of the workers in Merrimack Mills. See Hine report. Location: Huntsville, Alabama.

Olga Schubert, 855 Gruenwald St. The little 5 yr. old after a day's work that began about 5:00 A.M. helping her mother in the Biloxi Canning Factory, begun at an early hour, was tired out and refused to be photographed. The mother said, "Oh, She's ugly." Both she and other persons said picking shrimp was very hard on the fingers. See also photo 2021. Location: Biloxi, Mississippi.

Shore Line at Bay St. Louis, Miss.

10 year old Jimmie. Been shucking 3 years. 6 pots a day, and a 11 year old boy who shucks 7 pots. Also several members of an interesting family named Sherrica. Seven of them are in this factory. The father, mother, four girls shuck and pack. Older brother steams. 10 year old boy goes to school. Been in the oyster business 5 years. Father worked for 25 years in the Pennsylvania Coal Mine, and the oldest brother there? They said they liked the oysters business better because the family makes more. Varn & Platt Canning Co. Location: Bluffton, South Carolina

Girl - Baner? Carswell. Been in mill 4 years. 12 years old. Runs 6 sides = 60 cents a day. Soon will run 8 = 80 cents a day. Father said "the wife of neighbor made $7.40 last week, $1.40 more than her husband. Women and girls makes more than the men." Child 8 yrs. old helps sister. Location: Gastonia, North Carolina

Salvin Nocito, 5 years old, carries 2 pecks of cranberries for long distance to the "bushel-man." Whites Bog, Browns Mills, N.J. Sept. 28, 1910. Witness E.F. Brown. Location: Browns Mills, New Jersey Photo by Lewis W. Hine

Resting with the load at the head of the slope. Shaft #6 Pennsylvania Coal Co., Small boy is Jo Puma, a Nipper, 163 Pine Street. Jo's mother showed me the passport which shows Jo to be 14 years old, but he has no school certificate, although working inside the mine. Location: Pittston, Pennsylvania

Stringing milk tags (See 4916). Location: Newark, New Jersey

A typical Glass Works Boy, Indiana, Night Shift, Said he was 16 years old. 1 A.M. Location: Indiana

Olga Schubert, 855 Gruenwald St. The little 5 yr. old after a day's work that began about 5:00 A.M. helping her mother in the Biloxi Canning Factory, begun at an early hour, was tired out and refused to be photographed. The mother said, "Oh, She's ugly." Both she and other persons said picking shrimp was very hard on the fingers. See also photo 2021. Location: Biloxi, Mississippi

Topics

children cannery workers shrimp industry oyster industry mississippi bay st louis photographic prints lot 7476 national child labor committee collection lewis wickes hine photo peerless oyster co pick shrimp bay st ultra high resolution high resolution lewis w hine library of congress child labor