We often share the incredible photographs taken by Jack Delano in the Coal Region in the 1930s as he documented the life and culture among the mining communities, especially over on Facebook.
In a 1965 oral history performed by the Smithsonian Institution, he described how his photography projects in Schuylkill County during the Great Depression came to be:
When I got out of the Academy of Fine Arts, it was very difficult to find work as an illustrator, painter, and so on, and since I had been working at the NYA [National Youth Administration] I learned that the Federal Art Project was considering photography as part of their activities as well as painting.
I applied for it and wrote up a project, a photographic project that I was interested in doing. It had to do with a study of coal mining conditions in Schuylkill County in Pennsylvania which is an anthracite coal area and conditions were pretty horrible at that time. It was one of the depressed areas even then and it still is.
Bootleg mining was going on, there were a lot of abandoned mines and people were just . . . under cover of darkness, they would go down in these abandoned mines and bring up coal and sell it. This was strictly illegal but nobody could stop it because they were starving to death and this was the only way they could get a few pennies.
Well, I managed to convince the Federal Art Project people that this was a worthwhile thing to be covered photographically. So I worked on that for several months, living in the anthracite area and photographing. The result of this study was a big show which they put on, the Federal Art Project people, in the museum in Philadelphia with these photographs, of which I had done a large amount.
It was practically a one-man project. Also, I put together two photographic books which I made myself of original prints of this material…
Those books are now in the collections of the Library of Congress – we’ll continue sharing those photographs in the future.
Read more about the Coal Region during the Great Depression
Video interview | Talking about “The Bootleg Coal Rebellion” with author Mitch Troutman
The Coal Region’s struggle and resilience during the Great Depression | Article
“Due for a comeback?” – An address on the Coal Region on eve of Great Depression
Lykens miners determined to save their workplace at historic Short Mountain Colliery | October 1933
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Good interview about historical coal region stories. I enjoy the videos very much. Keep bringing history to life.
On a side note, Mitch mentioned silk mills also. Through my years of searching for our regions history,I came to realize the interconnection of the mob and government into this region.
Hi Jake, Did not even KNOW this Great History was in Print.! Thank You for Sharing!
Thank You Kindly, Joe, T