Childhood and Child Labor
Featured Sources
 "Little Burden Bearers" from Helping the Helpless in Lower New York by Lucy Seaman Bainbridge. |
This Photograph and Book Little Burden Bearers Helping the Helpless (1917) Catalog record More Photographs in Books "Children Make Artificial Violets" in NCLC, Children Who Work in the Tenements (1908?) "Carrying Violets to the Factory" in Van Kleeck, Artificial Flower Makers (1913) "Young Spinner in a Cotton Mill" in McKelway, Child Labor in Virginia (1912) "Children Drag and Carry Sacks" in Clopper, Causes of Absence from Rural Schools in Oklahoma (1917) Texts "The Children's Work" in NCLC, The Child in the Cotton Mill (1916) All child labor |
The photograph (above) of real children bearing "burdens" on foot, and the illustration of "The Way it Should Be" (below) suggest, among other things, the distance that often existed between actual childhood and its idealized image. Click on the links in the right-hand column for more examples of each.
![Handy Wagon Co., Our Handy Wagon, excerpt, [18--?].](images/handywagon1.gif) |
This Trade Catalog Read more Catalog record |
![Handy Wagon Co., Our Handy Wagon, excerpt, [18--?].](images/handywagon2.gif) From Our Handy Wagon, by the Handy Wagon Co., Canton, Ohio. |
More Illustrations Flexible Flyer: The Sled that Steers (1907) More Trade Catalogs "The Picnic Tea" (1896) "The Charm of Childhood" (1903) "Lawn Tennis" (1893) "Gathering Wild Flowers" (1893) "In Her Room" (1886) Photographs in Books Frontispiece, The Job of Being a Dad (1923) Texts "How to Make Blackberries" (1893) "What is in Your Boy's Pockets?" (1893) |
Click on the text excerpt above to expand the page and see another illustration, a "Child's Dream of a Wagon." Compare it with "The Farmer Boy," the photograph below. Again, click on the links in the right-hand column for more contrasting depictions of children and childhood.
 "The Farmer Boy," from Causes of Absence from Rural Schools in Oklahoma by Edward N. Clopper. |
This Photograph "The Farmer Boy" Catalog record for book More Photographs in Books "Young Glass-Works Boy" "Seven-year-old Bootblack" "Fourteen-year-old Boy in a Cotton Mill" "Four and six-year-old boys worming and suckering" Texts "Machinery and Manhood" All child labor |
 From The Burden of the City by Isabelle Horton (1904). |
This Text Read more Catalog record More Texts "The Band Begins to Play" (1907) "A Tenement Daisy" (1917) A Federal Children's Bureau (1908) |
The text above, where babies are described as having "wondering eyes" and "divine mysteries of life and character hidden in their unconscious hearts," and the two strikingly similar yet different images below suggest some ways the idealization of childhood helped to shape both the concern and the offerings reformers developed for poor children. Click on the links in the right-hand column for more texts by reformers and more examples of new children's programs.
 "May Pole Dance," from How to Amuse Yourself and Others, by Lina Beard and Adelia B. Beard, 1893. |
This Illustration "May Pole Dance" Catalog record Photographs in Books "Girls' Baseball Team," in: Care and Training of Orphan and Fatherless Girls, [1915] Texts "The Children's Hour," in: How to Learn and Earn, 1884 "A Day in Camp," in: Campward Ho!, c1920. |
 "The Children Play on Our Roof," from The House on Henry Street, by Lillian D. Wald, 1915. |
This Illustration "The Children Play on Our Roof" Catalog record More Photographs in Books "On the Playground," in: Child Welfare Work in Pennsylvania, 1915 More Photographs Children's Dances in Bronx Park Social Museum Collection People Jane Addams Florence Kelley |
In the text below and in those listed in the right-hand column, different ideas about the nature of childhood underpin different positions on the question of child labor.
 Raymond G. Fuller, Child Labor and the "New Day," 1920. |
This Text Read more Catalog record More Texts "...Choosing My Own Birthday," in: Through the Mill, 1911 "In Search of Bad Mill-Conditions," in: The Child That Toileth Not, 1912 "Polishing Brass Rings," in: Out to Win, 1917 "The Families," in: Work of Children on Truck and Small-Fruit Farms in Southern New Jersey, 1924 "Who Opposes the Child Labor Amendment?," in: Handbook on the Federal Child Labor Amendment, 1937 All child labor |
Selected Bibliography for Childhood and Child Labor
Calvert, Karin. Children in the House: The Material Culture of Early Childhood, 1600-1900. Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1992.
Carson, Mina. Settlement Folk: Social Thought and the American Settlement Movement, 1885-1930. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1990.
Hunter, Jane H. How Young Ladies Became Girls: The Victorian Origins of American Girlhood. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002.
Zelizer, Viviana A. Pricing the Priceless Child: The Changing Social Value of Children. New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1985.