"There is work that profits children, and there is work that brings profit only to employers. The object of employing children is not to train them, but to get high profits from their work."
-- Lewis Hine, 1908
The work of photographer Lewis Hine led to social reform in America in the early twentieth century. Hine (1874-1940), exposed the horrors of child- labor through his photography. The images Hine captured were instrumental in the alteration of child-labor laws in America.
During the industrial boom of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, children were pulled into the workforce. Wages were low, and many children were forced to work to help support their families. By 1910, over two million children under fifteen years old were working in America. Companies were eager to hire children because they were paid less than adults. These children lost their youth to to the factories and mills in which they labored. For many, school was sporadic at best. Overwork and poor working conditions were responsible for illness, stunted growth, and curvature of the spine. Children who worked in coal mines were susceptible to tuberculosis and bronchitis. Fatigue from overwork led to accidents and deaths. In 1904,The National Child Labor Committee, an organization whose goal was the abolition of child labor, was founded. Investigators were hired to find evidence of dangerous working conditions.
In 1913, Lewis Hine quit his teaching job and became an investigative photographer for the National Child Labor Committee. Hine traveled America, using his photography to document the working conditions of children in different industries. In order to do this, Hine had to become a bit of an actor. Factory managers did not want the plight of child workers to to uncovered and were very hostile to anyone who would expose the injustice. Hine often took on the identities of bible salesmen, fire inspectors, industrial photographers, and postcard vendors, in order to gain entry to workplaces. Hine knew that when people saw the injustices of child labor that laws would change. In 1916, the Keating-Owens Act was passed by Congress. This established a minimum working age of 14, a maximum workday of eight hours for a child, no night work for children under 16, and a documented proof of age. This act was later ruled unconstitutional, but legislation at the state level banned some child labor and set maximum workday hours. By the 1920’s, child labor was cut in half, and by the 1930’s, the New Deal prohibited manufacturing and mining for children under 16.
The above photo, taken by Hine, features a young girl who was a "spinner", at Whitnel Cotton Mill in North Carolina. Hine recorded that the girl was "51 inches high, has been working for one year, sometimes works at night, runs 4 sides, makes 48 cents a day. When asked how old she was, she hesitated, then said, "I don't remember," then added confidentially, "I'm not old enough to work, but do just the same." Out of 50 employees, there were ten children about her size." The photo speaks volumes. Hine is able to incorporate the subject, surrounding structures, clothing, and personal adornment. We view the girl, her youth contrasted against the age of the structure. The girl is naturally full of potential while the unnatural world surrounding her decays. The building is a cold, uncaring environment, that offers this young girl not the freedom in life that she deserves, but constant labor at a slave wage. The disheveled look of the girl indicates injustice, yet the braid and bow in her hair show her humanity. There is still life here, and for goodness sake, save it. Hine places the child and a bit of a factory machine in focus. The viewer is allowed to see the soft skin of the right hand next to the sharp metal of the machine. The background becomes an endless blur, lost, like the youth of so many of these working children. In an instant, Hine has the viewer empathizing with the child's situation, and with good reason. Hine's photography blends with social message, and becomes art.
Lewis Hine found art in photography through its ability to interpret the everyday world. He recorded the truth of the people. Hine's subjects look straight into the camera, forcing the viewer to look straight into the eyes of the subject. A personal bond is created. The subjects are not just characters in a painting, but real, living people. Hine's masterful methods were noticed, and his influence on photography grew. Hine's work captured the plight of children forced to labor, and while it triumphed in influencing the change in child labor laws, it is also a reminder. Some of these children were our grandparents and great-grandparents. America is barely removed from these images, and if we are not vigilant, injustices like child-labor can and will happen here again.
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