Russell Lee's Road

Roy Stryker, Farm Security Administration                                                 Russell Lee’s camera

The Road to Yeso, July 2010 by Bruce Berman

Article by Mary Lamonica

Russell Lee shot more photographs for the Farm Security Administration and stayed on the road longer for assignments than did any of the other photographers, including Arthur Rothstein and Dorothea Lange, both of whom were tremendously productive.

Roy Stryker, the FSA photographers’ supervisor, once said that he believed Russell Lee could stay on the road forever.  Lee, accompanied by his wife Jean from 1939 onward, seemed comfortable in an endless string of hotels. And, his letters to Stryker from the road reveal boundless curiosity about the nation and its citizens and empathy toward their living and working conditions during the years of the Great Depression. (more…)

June 2010, Roper girl texting, Portales, NM, by Bruce Berman

1936, Daughter of Drought stricken farmer, by Russell Lee/FSA

Commentary by Bruce Berman

Hard Times. That’s what they called the 1930′s.

We hear this word a lot now, too, to describe our times.

These two photos, above, might be a good description of what are the differences between now and then.

In the 1930′s the material wealth of people diminished greatly as the country fell into Depression. Eventually, there got to be, for many people, well, nothing.

In the 2010′s, it may be, we got to a point where, well,  we don’t have everything. (more…)

September 1938. Girls at a carnival in New Mexico by Russell Lee for the FSA.

by Mary Lamonica

If you compare Russell Lee’s photographs to those of other FSA photographers, Lee’s images often evoke the idea that people might have been laid low by the depression, but they certainly had not given up.

In their thousands of miles of travel for the FSA, Russell and Jean Lee found pride, optimism, and courage among the people they photographed and interviewed during the Great Depression. Jean Lee recounted what she felt were Americans’ defining qualities during that difficult era to interviewer Richard K. Doud of the Smithsonian Institution in June 1964:

“It was a tremendous pride that they all had. We saw them along ditch banks and they didn’t have anything, They were living on the ditch banks, they were picking wild berries to eat, because there was nothing else. But it was very seldom that you found a person who really felt whipped. Somehow they were going to go on until this afternoon, at least. Now they didn’t know what was going to happen tomorrow, but until late this afternoon, somehow it would work out all right. There was tremendous pride and tremendous courage; we found it everywhere.”

Hispanic girl from Chamisal, NM 1940, by Russell Lee

by Mary Lamonica

Drive through New Mexico today and you’ll find a state awash with vibrant cultures. Hispanics, Native Americans, Anglos, African Americans, and Asian Americans all call New Mexico home. Back in the late 1930s and early 1940s, Russell Lee and his boss, Roy Stryker, the head of the Farm Security Administration (FSA) which employed Russell Lee and the other FSA shooters (including Dorothea Lange, Walker Evans, Arthur Rothstein, John Vachon), knew many Americans were unfamiliar with Hispanics and Hispanic life. Racial laws supposedly providing “separate, but equal” facilities were anything but. Stryker and Lee were determined to do their part to change the situation by sending Lee on a lengthy documentary trip through the Southwest to showcase Hispanic life. New Mexico’s more than 221,000 Hispanics were the key draw. (more…)

Filling station in New Mexico. Boys pulling water from a well.

photograph by Russell Lee

by Mary Lamonica

Cars. By 1929, more than 26.5 million automobiles cris-crossed American roads. Between one-third and one-half of all families owned a vehicle when the stock market collapsed in October 1929.

Although many Americans lost homes and jobs during the Great Depression, those who could hung onto their automobiles and their radios. Both brought dreams of a better life, but cars might actually be able to get people there.

Cars, therefore, were more than mere vehicles of transportation during the depression years. Cars were hope. Cars were freedom. Cars often were homes, too, as abundant FSA photographs attest. It’s not surprising that so many people (more…)

Bulletin Board in Post Office Showing a Large Collection of

“Wanted Men” Signs, Ames, Iowa, 1936, by Russell Lee

Little American Flags, cut up and turned sideways,

Post Office in Garfield, New Mexico,

May 2010, by Bruce Berman

Iola Alvarez, Postmistress of Garfield, NM

She holds a 1922 postal register, May 2010

by ©Bruce Berman

by Bruce Berman

It’s probably hard to believe it, but I never saw this image of Russell Lee’s until this morning. This keeps happening. It either means I’m an unoriginal wannabe, or that there is still a lot out there that is similar to what used to be out there, and it’s still good “Cannon Fodder,” for a photographer.

The Postmistress, Iola Alvarez, in Garfield, New Mexico, claims these mailboxes were first installed in 1919. (more…)

(L) May 1939. “Statue to the watermelon.  Weatherford, Texas, watermelon center.” by Russell Lee, Farm Security Administration.

(R) May 2010, “Hot Dog,” in the trailer lot, Hatch, New Mexico, by Bruce Berman

Dairy cow in Bethel, New Mexico, July 2010

©Bruce Berman

2010-2011 Queen of Heritage Days (and her son Lorenzo),

Darlene Pino, Magdalena, NM, July 2010

©Bruce Berman

October 1938. “Princesses on float at the National Rice Festival parade.

Crowley, Louisiana by Russell Lee for the FSA.

by Bruce Berman

Russell Lee went to a lot of parades, festivals and public events. So do I. Most information-oriented photographers do. It’s a good place to shoot because people are busy having fun, not thinking too much about what purpose a photographer might have for the photographs and a good photographer can come home with a lot of images that show people doing things, living life, interacting.

Some call this Street Photography. (more…)