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| Austin Curtis, 10 yrs old, Institute, WV, Oct 10, 1921. Photo by Lewis Hine. CLICK TO ENLARGE. |
Austin Curtis and his pig
project. He is a young colored boy living near the W. Va. Collegiate Institute, the State Colored Agri. College. Location:
Charleston [vicinity], West Virginia, October 10, 1921 / Photo by Lewis W. Hine.
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| Alice Curtis, 13 yrs old, Institute, West Virginia, October 10, 1921. Photo by Lewis Hine. |
Alice Curtis and her poultry.
Location: Charleston [vicinity], West Virginia, October 10, 1921 / Photo by Lewis W. Hine.
African Americans appear in only several dozen photographs that Lewis Hine took for the National Child Labor Committee.
Obviously, this was the result of racial discrimination, but not on the part of Hine. Textile mills, factories, and canneries,
where Hine took many of his pictures, were almost never integrated. Most mainstream newspapers catered principally to whites,
seldom reporting news involving black residents, so almost all newsboys and newsgirls were white. And there were very few
successful black-oriented newspapers. Since there were not very many black-owned farms, most children employed as pickers
were white. So Hine seldom encountered African Americans in the fields. As unfortunate as child labor was, it was not a "luxury"
available to non-whites, especially among the occupations Hine concentrated on.
In 1921, three years after the bulk of his child labor work was completed, Hine
accepted an assignment from the National Child Labor Committee to photograph West Virginia school children, many that were
involved in 4-H programs. Early that year, the state had enacted progressive laws limiting child labor and mandating school
attendance. Hine's pictures were supposed to illustrate how those laws were affecting the quality of life for children who
might otherwise be typical child laborers.
Institute,
where Austin Curtis and his sister Alice were photographed, is a small town near Charleston, formed in the 1890s around West
Virginia Colored Institute, a black agricultural college. In 1915, the name was changed to West Virginia Collegiate Institute.
It is now called West Virginia State University, and was fully integrated in the 1950s, following the historic Brown V. Board
of Education decision.
Hine photographed
one other African-American child in Institute, on the same day. His name was George Cox. In one of two pictures of him, he
was getting guidance from Austin W. Curtis, the dean of the college, and the father of Austin and Alice Curtis. George's story
is also posted on this site, and I have provided a link to it at the end of this story.
Hine could not have imagined the level of accomplishment that Austin and Alice
were destined to achieve. Austin became an especially notable figure when he was hired as an assistant to George Washington
Carver, the legendary botanist, educator and inventor, and one of the most celebrated African Americans of the 20th
century.
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