Mother Jones: The Photos That Helped End Child Labor in the United States

[Omaha Steve]

Breaker boys who worked in Ewen Breaker of Pennsylvania Coal Company, South Pittston, Pennsylvania

http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2015/10/kids-coal-mines-lewis-hines-photos

Lewis Hine sometimes went undercover to capture images of kids at work.
—By Mark Murrmann | Sat Oct. 3, 2015 6:00 AM EDT

In the early 1900s, Lewis Hine left his job as a schoolteacher to work as a photographer for the National Child Labor Committee, investigating and documenting child labor in the United States. As a sociologist, Hine was an early believer in the power of photography to document work conditions and help bring about change. He traveled the country, going to fields, factories, and mines—sometimes working undercover—to take pictures of kids as young as four years old being put to work.

Partly as a result of Hine's work (as well as that of Mary Harris Jones, who Mother Jones is named after), Congress passed the Keating-Owens Child Labor Act in 1916. It established child labor standards, including a a minimum age (14 years old for factories, and 16 years old for mines) and an eight-hour workday. It also barred kids under the age of 16 from working overnight. However, the Keating-Owens Act was later ruled unconstitutional, and lasting reform to federal child labor laws didn't come until the New Deal.

In 2004, retired social worker Joe Manning set out to see what had happened to as many of the kids in Hine's photos as he could find. He's documented his findings—showing the lives of hundreds of subjects—on his website, MorningsOnMapleStreet.com.

Many more great photos at link!

[tblue37]

1. My grandfather might be in that photo. I have never seen a pic of him that young, but he lived

in Pittston and worked in the mines. I did find one pic of him at 18, guiding a coal laden donkey from the mine. (He worked the mines starting at age 13.)

[passiveporcupine]

2. And republicans seem to want to take us back to this

Even some blue dogs seem to want to. TPP my ass.

[ornotna]

3. Lewis Wickes Hine took many photos of child laborers.

Shorpy Higginbotham was one of them.

http://www.shorpy.com/shorpy

[louis c]

4. And Is There any Wonder Why We Need Unions?

[Scuba]

5. Republicans want to go back to this era, as do some Democrats.