Return to  America Hurrah       Return to PhotoShow Index        Comments to  billroddy@ cox.net    

Dorothea Lange Story and Images from the Library of Congress 

Her Migrant Mother photo at Nipomo and why she left for California's Imperial Valley.
Official notice of horrible camp conditions there in thumb-nail.

(scroll down for details and PhotoShows)


Migrant Mother, Nipomo, CA, Lange caption:
"Destitute pea pickers in California. Mother of seven children. Age 32."

             

Image, Source: digital file from original file
"Florence Thompson with several of her children in a tent shelter.
"Born 1903. Died 1983.

Lange leaves Nipomo.

Letter to Roy Stryker, Director, Historical Division, Farm Security Administration.

I was forced to switch from Nipomo to the Imperial Valley because of the conditions there. They have always been notoriously bad as you know and what goes on in the Imperial is beyond belief. The Imperial Valley has a social structure all its own and partly because of its isolation in the state those in control get away with it. But this year's freeze practically wiped out the crop and what it didn't kill is delayed--in the meanwhile, because of the warm, no rain climate and possibilities for work the region is swamped with homeless moving families. The relief association offices are open day and night 24 hours. The people continue to pour in and there is no way to stop them and no work when they get there.

Below Application from H. E. Drobish, Director California Division of Rural Rehabilitation for Federal Funds..
(click on thumb-nail.)

Lange PhotoShows
(set display to full screen and turn on speakers for shows with music.)

Great Depression 1930s.     Imperial Valley 1935     San Francisco Salvation Army 1939    S. F. relocation of Japanese-Americans