I Just Read About That…

[VIEWED: August 5, 2010] America in Color 1939-1943

The Denver Post recently published 70 color photographs from the Depression.   You can see them all here.  The photographs are part of the Library of Congress’ collection of photos.  The Library of Congress’ collection houses 1,600 color and over 160,000 black and white photos from this period in American history.  It is a bit more for scholars, as you can’t just browse the pictures like in the Denver Post site, but for completeness, you really must check out the LOC prints.  They’re available here.

But back to the Denver Post.  The Post’s collection of 70s prints come from the Library of Congress’ 2006 Exhibit Bound for Glory: America in Color.  These Post’s pictures are very large and very clear (they are reproduced from slides).  And they are all downloadable.

They include photos from New Mexico, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, Georgia, Oklahoma, Arizona, Colorado, Idaho, California, Texas, Nebraska, Ohio, Montana, South Carolina, Tennessee, Mississippi, Louisiana, Washington D.C., Illinois, Iowa, Virginia, Kansas, Kentucky and Michigan.

And, they show the amazingly diverse makeup of the country.  From a peach farmer to a railway worker.  From kids fishing, to kids playing in the snow.  From women at a fair, to women welding.  From men on horseback to men in front of bomber.  Not to mention, the creation of the Shasta Dam!  (It’s amazing — #28)

The thing that amazes me most about these pictures is that although some things have changed quite dramatically in sixty years, other things haven’t.  Kids still fish, stores still sell fruits and veggies, and people still love pictures of scenery and interesting faces.

You can obviously tell that these pictures are old.  Even the ones without people just look old, why is that?–see #2 in particular for one that looks old even though nothing in the picture is dated.  Or picture #11: the women’s faces simply look like the were photographed 60 years ago.  Or this one, which I’m including.  There’s nothing particularly dated about the picture, and yet you can tell this didn’t just happen in 2010.

Of course, the clothes look dated, but not as much as you might think.  And, even more of course, men all wore hats back then.  #18 and #23 really highlight that.  I also really enjoy seeing the old cars #25-#27

Aside from marvelling at the changes in the country, I was also thinking about the people in these pictures.  Some of them are very likely still alive.  So, does the girl making the hilarious face in #12 know that she is on exhibit nationwide?  Or the sleeping kids in #15?

And then of course, there’s the more abstract pictures (it’s nice they took ones like this, too).  #46 show s a classic shot of sparks flying from a welder and #47 shows a cool shot of an Illinois train yard.   (They’re two of the few that don’t look dated at all).

And then there’s the scenes of women working.  Of course in 2010 women work all the time.  But somehow it seems remarkable to see the women sitting together at lunch in their overalls.  Or the very cool shot of the woman fixing a bolt on a bomber (#66)–I feel she is under-dressed for the work!

I’m also amused at how much I love seeing the old ads for things (Pabst Blue Ribbon!) in these photos.  Most of the time, I try my best to avoid ads–on TV, in magazines, I just feel supersaturated by them.  And yet, these old billboards and signs are very cool to me.  Is there any chance that in 40 years I’ll be nostalgic for the “I Hate Steven Singer” Billboard on the way into Philadelphia?

I’m including a couple of pictures here, but it’s worth seeing them large on the Post‘ site