Weekend, February 10-11, 2024 – 1930’S SURVEY OF RURUAL LIFE IN AMERICA

By admin

WEEKEND

FEBRUARY 10-11, 2024

 
ISSUE # 1179
 

DEPRESSION ERA

 

PHOTOS BY 

BEN SHAHN

PART 1

SHORPY, AMERICAN HISTORICAL PHOTO ARCHIVE

October 1935. Young residents of Amite City, Louisiana. View full size. 35mm nitrate negative by Ben Shahn for the Farm Security Administration.

October 1935. Natchez, Mississippi. “Two women walking along the street.” 35mm negative by Ben Shahn for the Resettlement Administration. View full size.

Summer 1938. Hamburger stand at the Buckeye Lake amusement park near Columbus. View full size. 35mm nitrate negative by Ben Shahn, who goes on to describe the place: “Buckeye Lake is the weekend and summer months resort for all of central Ohio. Its patrons are clerks, Columbus politicians, laborers, businessmen, droves of high school and college students. The rich occupy one side of the lake, the rest rent cottages on the other side. It has an evil reputation and an evil smell. It has furnished Columbus and the neighboring small towns and cities with dancing, cottaging, swimming, etc. for several generations. This is the most unsavory place the photographer ran across in Ohio.” But how are the hot dogs?

October 1935. “Poverty on the march.” Wife and child of destitute Ozark family in Arkansas. 35mm nitrate negative by Ben Shahn. View full size.

Summer 1938. Drugstore window in Newark, Ohio. View full size. Photograph (35mm nitrate negative) by Ben Shahn, Farm Security Administration.

1937. “Mrs. Mary McLean, Skyline Farms, Alabama.” 35mm nitrate negative by Ben Shahn for the Farm Security Administration. View full size.

Interior of tenant farmer home. Little Rock, Arkansas. October 1935. The “round thing” is an old-fashioned convex mirror. View full size. Photo by Ben Shahn.

Summer 1938. “Street Scene in Circleville, Ohio. Because of its non-industrial surroundings, retains much of old-time flavor.” Reflected in the glass we can see Ben Shahn snapping this picture with his Leica pointed sideways. View full size. 35mm nitrate negative by Ben Shahn for the Farm Security Administration.

PHOTO OF THE DAY

THE ISLAND NOBODY KNOWS
PUBLISHED IN 1969 SHOWING THE FUTURISTIC VIEWS
OF THE ISLAND THEN CALLED WELFARE ISLAND

Text by Judith Berdy

IMAGES AND TEXT 
SHORPY HISTORIC AMERICAN PHOTO ARCHIVE
Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS
Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website
Edited by Melanie Colter and Dottie Jeffries

MAYA LEVANON-PHOTOS TIK TOK & INSTAGRAM

All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated

www.tiktok.com/@rooseveltislandhsociety
Instagram roosevelt_island_history

THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.

Copyright © 2024 Roosevelt Island Historical Society, All rights reserved.Our mailing address is:
rooseveltislandhistory@gmail.com