Lewis W. Hine, Driver In A West Virginia Mine, 1909,modern gelatin silver copy print. Courtesy George Eastman House
Lewis W. Hine, Spinner In A New England Mill, 1913,modern gelatin silver copy print. Courtesy George Eastman House
Lewis W. Hine, Child Picking Long Island Potatoes, 1912modern gelatin silver copy print. Courtesy George Eastman House
Let Children Be Children
LEWIS WICKES HINE’S
Crusade Against Child Labor
November 11, 2007 to March 2, 2008
Whatcom Museum, 1892 Old City Hall BuildingIf you have a desire to learn more about who is who in the history of American photography, come visit us this November for the exhibition Let Children Be Children: Lewis Wickes Hine’s Crusade Against Child Labor. This heart-wrenching exhibition will open November 11, 2007, and run through March 2, 2008. Lewis Wickes Hine (American, 1874-1940) was a sociologist whose photographs captured his abiding concern for children, immigrants, and working-class people.
Born in 1874 in Oshkosh, Wisconsin, Hine began his career in photography by documenting newly arrived immigrants at Ellis Island in 1905. A year later, he was hired by the National Child Labor Committee (NCLC) to document the harsh conditions in which children worked. Hine spent ten years documenting conditions in the canneries, coal mines, cotton mills, farms, and sweatshops common during the early 20th century. Through the use of photography, Hine and the NCLC endeavored to gain the attention of the government and arouse public sentiment against child labor practices in the United States.
A telling look at the industrialization of America, this exhibition of 55 modern photographs from historic images illustrates the conditions that poor working children endured until the Fair Labor Standards Act with its component against child labor was passed in 1938. It is drawn entirely from the George Eastman House’s photographic collection in Rochester, New York, which contains nearly 10,000 of Hine’s original photographs, negatives and artifacts. The Hine collection, which was given to the Eastman House in 1955 by the Photo League of New York, is the world’s largest holding of his work.
Organized by the George Eastman House, this exhibition highlights an era of our history through the lens of a photographer whose work helped to bring about change. We hope these images will enlighten all ages about this part of American history and spark an interest in finding out more about the work of Lewis Wickes Hine, as well as other great American photographers.