In this activity, students will go through the process of document analysis to better understand a photograph taken by Lewis Hine, when he was an investigative photographer for the National Child Labor Committee. After analyzing the photograph, they will try to explain how the scene shown in the photograph impacted Hine, and what impression or message he was trying to convey to those who would see his photo.
Suggested Teaching Instructions
This activity can be used during a unit on child labor or the Progressive Era. It can serve as an introduction to the study of child labor or muckraking, to be followed by a more extensive study or discussion about the impact that Lewis Hine and others' work had on the movement to end child labor. It also serves to teach or reinforce the process of document (photograph) analysis. For grades 6-12. Approximate time needed is 25 minutes.
Direct students to begin the activity individually or in pairs. After reading the introduction, including the photo's caption, they should spend a minute or two looking at the photograph unassisted. Then they should proceed to answer the questions that follow, which will guide them through the process of document (photograph) analysis: Meet the document. Observe its parts. Try to make sense of it. Use it as historical evidence.
Once students have worked through the analysis questions and click "When You're Done," they will be presented with a quote from Lewis Hine about the subjectivity of photography — he described his work as "photo-interpretation" and defined a good photograph as "a reproduction of impressions made upon the photographer which he desires to repeat to others." Students will answer:
- Explain how the scene shown in the photograph must have impacted Hine (the impression it made on him). What emotions do you think he was feeling?
- What did he focus on - what parts of the scene impacted him most?
- What impression did Hine want the photo to make on those who saw it?
After students have responded to the concluding questions, conduct a class discussion about their answers, and about the role of journalists and photographers like Hine in the movement to end child labor and the Progressive Era.
Students will also be provided with the following additional background information to help them understand Hine's work in the conclusion:
The industrial boom of the late 1800s and early 1900s caused an increased demand for labor. Factory wages were so low that children often worked to help support their families. The number of children under age 15 who worked in industrial jobs climbed from 1.5 million in 1890 to 2 million in 1910. Businesses liked to hire children because they worked in unskilled jobs for lower wages than adults, and their small hands made them more adept at handling small parts and tools.
These underage workers rarely attended school. Many were underweight, suffered stunted growth and curvature of the spine, and began to develop serious health problems. They developed diseases related to their work environment, such as tuberculosis and bronchitis for those who worked in coal mines or cotton mills. And they faced high accident rates due to the fatigue caused by hard work and long hours.
By the early 1900s many Americans were calling child labor "child slavery" and were demanding an end to it. In 1904 a group of progressive reformers founded the National Child Labor Committee and received a charter from Congress in 1907. It hired investigators to gather evidence of children working in harsh conditions, to try to abolish child labor.
Hine was one of these photographic investigators. In many instances he tricked his way into factories to take pictures that factory managers didn't want the public to see. He was careful to document every photograph with precise facts and figures. To obtain captions for his pictures, he interviewed the children and then scribbled notes with his hand hidden inside his pocket. Because of how he got access, he was "double-sure that my photo data was 100% pure--no retouching or fakery of any kind."
The National Child Labor Committee organized exhibitions with the investigators' photographs and statistics to explain what was happening. This led to the establishment in 1912 of the Children's Bureau as a Federal department for gathering information on child labor, which became part of the Department of Labor.
This activity was adapted from an article, published on www.archives.gov/education, written by Linda Darus Clark, a teacher at Padua Franciscan High School in Parma, Ohio.
