Social History for Every Classroom

Search

Social History for Every Classroom

menuAmerican Social History Project  ·    Center for Media and Learning

Child Cotton Pickers Haul Heavy Loads

Child cotton-pickers on a farm in Bells, Texas, documented by Lewis W. Hine, a photographer for the National Child Labor Committee. Children had long been used as cotton-pickers and other agricultural workers in the South, where the tradition of sharecropping as well as sheer economic necessity made the practice widespread. In the caption to this photo, Hine notes, "All these children five years, six years, seven years, nine years [of age]... The very young children like to pick, but before long they detest it. Sun is hot, hours long, bags heavy."

All these children five years, six years, seven years, nine years and two a little older, were picking cotton on H.M. Lane's farm Bells, Tex. Only one adult, an aunt was picking. Father was plowing. Edith, five years, (see preceding photo) picks all day.
Source | Lewis W. Hine, "All these children five years", 1913, black and white photograph, Library of Congress Online Prints and Photographs Collection, http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.pnp/nclc.00199.
Creator | Lewis W. Hine
Item Type | Photograph
Cite This document | Lewis W. Hine, “Child Cotton Pickers Haul Heavy Loads,” SHEC: Resources for Teachers, accessed March 19, 2024, https://shec.ashp.cuny.edu/items/show/1050.

Themes

Work

Print and Share