The Great Depression of the 1930s brought about devastation to families nationwide. Taken by Dorothea Lange in 1936, this picture of Florence Owens Thompson portrays many women’s situations during this time period. This picture grew to be very popular and was named “The Migrant Mother”. In this photograph, Florence Owens Thompson is pictured with her children, living under a tent in the Great Depression. In 1978, a reporter found the women in this picture to be living in a trailer park in California, and learned her story. Thompson was born a Cherokee in Oklahoma in 1908. After marrying at age 17, she moved to California to work on a farm. Her husband died in 1931, leaving Florence and her six kids widowed and desperate for money. She worked many odd end jobs that required much manual labor, while living under a bridge with her children. She was hesitant to allow the photograph of her family be the image of poverty. Lange convinced her that the snapshot would help educate people of what poverty was like at that time, so Thompson consented ("Phelan"). Florence Thompson and her family represent so many of the lower class families of the 1930s. Women of this class were expected to provide for their family when they had nothing to give. They scrambled to make do with what little they had. They skipped meals so that their children could eat, and wore scraps of clothing so that they could spend money on other items.
Other pictures of this depression show young girls and children clothed in rags, and clothing that barely covered their bodies. Women wore practical outfits that were reusable and could sustain great deterioration. This clothing choice differed from that of the previous century, and even the previous decade, where women of any class could choose to dress up and wear frivolous clothing. The 1930s contrast perfectly with the 1920s because women of the Jazz Age expanded their self-expression through fashion. They were able to enjoy fashion as a luxury to be enjoyed. However, the 1930s saw a decrease in this freedom because of the crash of the economy and the restriction of money. The Great Depression taught women of future decades to be more frugal in dress while understanding how to balance fashion with practicality. The decade of the 1930s was a realization to women, especially of the lower classes, that fashion is often makeshift. This decade opened the eyes of many of the levity of the 1920s and forced women into a more sensible sense of fashion.
Sources:
Conway, Edmund. "Worst Slump since Great Depression." The Telegraph. October 19, 2008. Accessed September 23, 2014.
Phelan, Ben. "The Story of the "Migrant Mother"" PBS. Accessed September 21, 2014.
Shield, Silver. September 21, 2011. Accessed September 21, 2014.
Sources:
Conway, Edmund. "Worst Slump since Great Depression." The Telegraph. October 19, 2008. Accessed September 23, 2014.
Phelan, Ben. "The Story of the "Migrant Mother"" PBS. Accessed September 21, 2014.
Shield, Silver. September 21, 2011. Accessed September 21, 2014.