Explore Dust Bowl Refugees Reach a “Promised Land”—California

Read About This Photograph by Dorothea Lange

This photograph was taken by photographer Dorothea Lange. It was printed in the New York Times newspaper on July 5, 1936. The caption said: “‘A Family Unit in The Flight From Drought’/Dust Bowl Refugees Reach a ‘Promised Land’—California.”

You can see orange marks and notes on the photo. These were made by workers at the newspaper. They drew on the photo to show the printer which parts to include. They wanted to zoom in closer on the car packed with people and all their things—like blankets, cooking pans, a stove, a bag of rice, and suitcases. Today, people think of Dorothea Lange’s photographs as important art that you wouldn’t just draw on. But back then, the newspaper workers felt okay changing her photo because they saw it as a news picture, not artwork.

Who Were These People?

The people in the car were among the thousands of families from the middle of America. They used to be farmers, but huge dust storms in the 1930s, known as the Dust Bowl, destroyed their farms. One man from Oklahoma remembered what it was like when he was three years old:

For a three-year-old kid, you just go outside and play, dust blows and sand blows, and you don’t know any different. One evening, a black duster come in here from the north. We had kerosene lamps. And it got so dark you couldn’t see with kerosene lamps.

These families couldn’t farm anymore. They saw ads and heard stories about California—a sunny place with lots of farm jobs. So they packed everything they could fit in their cars or tie on top, and they drove to California hoping for a better life.

Questions

Write or discuss your responses.

• What can you say about the people in this picture?
• How can you tell that the people in this picture are not just taking a short trip?
• Describe what one day of their journey might be like.
• Pick one person in the photograph and try to imagine what, if anything, he or she most regretted leaving behind in order to move to California.
• Pick one person in the photograph and try to imagine what he or she was thinking at the moment that Lange took the picture.