Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Photograph Collection

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Franklin D. Roosevelt, after taking office in 1932, had secured the acceptance for his New Deal Programs. In the first three years of his tenure, Roosevelt and his administration established several “marketing” plans for New Deal initiatives. In 1935, he added another that not only had far-reaching impact in that decade, but also still resonates in American social and political history. The Roosevelt Administration commissioned the Historical Division of the Farm Security Administration to undertake the challenging project of interviewing, photographing, and documenting rural scenes, farm individuals and families throughout a wide span of the nation, garnering evidence of the ravages of the Great Depression, the scars of the Dust Bowl and the impact of new farm technology on rural small town life, American farmers and farmland, and areas of the American landscape in general. (https://www.kennedy-center.org/education/resources-for-educators/classroom-resources/media-and-interactives/media/literary-arts/john-steinbeck--the-grapes-of-wrath/chapters/photography-in-the-fsa/) The photographs in the Farm Security Administration/Office of War Information Photograph Collection form an extensive pictorial record of American life between 1935 and 1944. This U.S. government photography project was headed for most of its existence by Roy E. Stryker, who guided the effort in a succession of government agencies: the Resettlement Administration (1935-1937), the Farm Security Administration (1937-1942), and the Office of War Information (1942-1944). The collection also includes photographs acquired from other governmental and non-governmental sources, including the News Bureau at the Offices of Emergency Management (OEM), various branches of the military, and industrial corporations. In total, the black-and-white portion of the Library of Congress collection consists of about 175,000 black-and-white film negatives, encompassing both negatives that were printed for FSA-OWI use and those that were not printed at the time. (https://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/fsa/)

Keywords

Farm
Administration
photograph
black and white
landscape
people