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Catalog Data

Maker:
Lange, Dorothea  Search this
Physical Description:
paper (overall material)
Object Name:
photograph
Place Made:
United States: California
Date made:
1936
Description:
During the Great Depression, government photographer Dorothea Lange took this picture at a migrant farmworkers' camp near Nipomo, California. Lange's brief caption recorded her impressions of the family's plight: "Destitute pea pickers ... a 32-year-old mother of seven children."
First published in a San Francisco newspaper, this poignant image became one of the most famous photographs of the Depression era, emblematic of the hardships suffered by poor migrant families. The "migrant mother," anonymous for many years, was later identified as Oklahoma native Florence Thompson.
Location:
Currently not on view
Related event:
Great Depression  Search this
Related Publication:
Sewer, Andy; Allison, David; Liebhold, Peter; Davis, Nancy; Franz, Kathleen G.. American Enterprise: A History of Business in America
National Museum of American History. Treasures of American History online exhibition
Related Web Publication:
http://americanhistory.si.edu/treasures
ID Number:
1983.0069.07
Accession number:
1983.0069
Catalog number:
83.69.7
See more items in:
Work and Industry: Photographic History
Government, Politics, and Reform
National Treasures exhibit
Photography
Data Source:
National Museum of American History
GUID:
http://n2t.net/ark:/65665/ng49ca746ab-f81e-704b-e053-15f76fa0b4fa
EDAN-URL:
edanmdm:nmah_1313354