Tenant Farming and Sharecropping in the Post-Civil War South – Object #6

Interior of Negro Tenant Farmer’s Home, Little Rock, Arkansas

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<p>A young black boy sits on a chair inside his home. The walls are papered with newspaper and advertisements. The house has little furniture and is poorly lighted.</p>

A view of the interior of an African American tenant farmer’s home, October 1935.

Questions:

Are there any familiar items or details that you notice in this photograph of the inside of a house?

What is life like for this little boy?

Why did the photographer take this picture?

What can we infer about the people who live in this house from the picture?

Citations

United States Resettlement Administration, Shahn, Ben, photographer. Interior of Negro tenant farmer’s home. Little Rock, Arkansas. October 1935. Farm Security Administration – Office of War Information Collection, Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division