Michigan remembered : photographs from the Farm Security Administration and the Office of War Information, 1936-1943 / edited by Constance B. Schulz ; with introductory essays by Constance B. Schulz and William H. Mulligan, Jr.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Schulz, Constance B.

United States. Farm Security Administration.

United States. Office of War Information.

Series:

Great Lakes books

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Depressions.

Manners and customs.

Michigan--Social life and customs--20th century--Pictorial works.

Michigan.

Michigan--Pictorial works.

Depressions--1929--Michigan--Pictorial works.

Genre:

Pictorial works.

Illustrated works.

Physical Description:

236 pages : illustrations ; 27 cm.

Place of Publication:

Detroit : Wayne State University Press, [2001]

Summary:

In the collections of the Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress are more than 1500 photographs of the state of Michigan during the depression and wartime years of the 1930s and 1940s, taken by some of the most talented photographers of that generation.

The FSA photographs have become the nation's visual memory of these trying times. Michigan Remembered contains 150 of these images, chosen to represent various geographic areas of Michigan, the economic diversity of the state and its people, and a broad range of subjects ranging from urban and industrial scenes of Detroit and the surrounding areas to images of the Upper Peninsula and rural and community life in the Lower Peninsula. The two introductory essays enhance the story told by the photographs. The first, by William H. Mulligan Jr., recounts the history of Michigan during the momentous events of the depression and wartime years. The second, by Constance B. Schulz, tells the lesser known story of the origins of the FSA in the agricultural program of the New Deal, and explains the importance of Roy E. Stryker as the agency's director and the process by which more than 200,000 photographs were accumulated in the FSA/OWI files. Brief biographical sketches of the photographers include descriptions of their travels and work in Michigan.

Michigan Remembered joins more than a dozen other state studies of the FSA/OWI photographs and provides a unique visual perspective on a key midwestern state during the mid-twentieth century. It will be of interest both to scholars of historical documentary photography and Michigan history, and to those fascinated by historical photographs of years which they, their parents, or their grandparents can still recall.

Contents:

Michigan in the Great Depression: The Dream Lost, The Dream Reclaimed / William H. Mulligan, Jr. 15

Roy Stryker, the Farm Security Administration, and the Office of War Information / Constance B. Schulz 39

I. The Upper Peninsula, 1937 and 1941 51

II. Rural Lower Michigan, 1936-42 81

III. Industrial Michigan, 1939-41 117

IV. The Industrial Southeast Prepares for War, 1941-42 131

V. The Industrial Southeast at War: Wartime Industry, 1941-43 157

VI. Life on the Michigan Home Front, 1941-43 187.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 235-236).

ISBN:

0814328202

OCLC:

45172824