How To Think Like A Historian

A Framework for Teachers

Bruce A. Vansledright

REVOLUTION, REACTION AND REFORM IN HISTORY

2011-2012 National History Day Theme

• Thinking like a Historian: How to research and analyze a History Day theme.

• Questions Historical Detectives Ask to Solve the Mysteries of the Past

1. Formulate a Historically Significant Question

THINK

What is important about the event, person, idea, movement, etc. to the historical context or period?

EXAMPLE• What were working conditions like for children

in the United States in the late 1800s and early 1900s?

2. Find Evidence About the Historical Question

THINK

• What evidence best answers the historical question?ExamplesPrimary Historical Photographs, Political Cartoons and Documents

Lewis Hine At Work

Child Labor in America

The Use & Abuse of Child Labor

Exploitation of Children in America

The Fate of Children in America

Children Working for Adults

Working in the Mills

The Mill: Some boys and girls were so small they had to climb up on to the spinning frame to mend broken threads and to put back the empty bobbins. Bibb Mill No. 1. Macon, Georgia.

Working in the Coal Mines

View of the Ewen Breaker of the Pennsylvania Coal Co. The dust was so dense at times as to obscure the view. This dust penetrated the utmost recesses of the boys' lungs. A kind of slave-driver sometimes stands over the boys, prodding or kicking them into obedience. South Pittston, Pennsylvania.

Working in the Bowling Alley

Bowling Alley boys. Many of them work setting pins until past midnight. New Haven, Connecticut.

Working on the Streets

Francis Lance, 5 years old, 41 inches high. He jumps on and off moving trolley cars at the risk of his life. St. Louis, Missouri.

Working in the Cigar Factory

Young cigar makers in Engelhardt & Co. Three boys looked under 14. Labor leaders told me in busy times many small boys and girls were employed. Youngsters all smoke. Tampa, Florida.

Working in the Oyster Cannery

Oyster shuckers working in a canning factory. All but the very smallest babies work. Began work at 3:30 a.m. and expected to work until 5 p.m. The little girl in the center was working. Her mother said she is "a real help to me.” Dunbar, Louisiana.

Working in the Cotton Fields

Six-year-old Warren Frakes. Mother said he picked 41 pounds yesterday "An I don't make him pick; he picked some last year." Has about 20 pounds in his bag. Comanche County, Oklahoma.

Harvesting Tobacco

Three boys, one of 13 yrs., two of 14 yrs., picking shade-grown tobacco on Hackett Farm. The "first picking" necessitates a sitting posture. Buckland, Connecticut.

Picking Berries

Norris Luvitt. Been picking 3 years in berry fields near Baltimore.

Working in the Glass Factory

Rob Kidd, one of the young workers in a glass factory. Alexandria, Virginia.

Sewing in the Factory

Working At Home - Piecework

A Jewish family and neighbors working until late at night sewing garters. The youngest work until 9 p.m. The others until 11 p.m. or later. On the left is Mary, age 7, and 10-year-old Sam, and next to the mother is a 12-year-old boy. On the right are Sarah, age 7, next is her 11 year old sister, 13-year-old brother.

Father is out of work and also helps make garters. New York City.

Lewis Hine’s Report on Visiting Mississippi Cotton Mills

Autobiography of Harriet RobinsonA Lowell Mill Girl

3. Evaluate Sources of Evidence

THINK

• Where does the evidence originate?

• How can its origins be verified?

• What is the relative importance of each source to the historical question?

Wikipedia – Child Labor LawsSecondary Source

Library of CongressPrimary Sources

The Words of Lewis Hine

“There is work that profits children, and there is work that brings profit only to employers. The object of employing children is not to train them, but to get high profits from their work.”

Lewis Hine, 1908

The Words of Child Workersin North & South Carolina

• “Oh, it was awful hot. You’d come out of there, your clothes was plumb wet…all that stuff arunnin’, machinery makin’ heat. It was bad. Terrible hot out here.” North Carolina

• “It’s pitiful for the child working at twelve years old. Wake up every morning at five o’clock, go to work at 6:20. Get up and eat a good breakfast and get waked up, then it’s time to go to work. And you worked eleven hours a day.” South Carolina

4. Assess the Reliability of the Sources of Evidence

THINK• How close in time, place, etc. are the sources to the

event, person, movement, etc.?

• What are motivations/biases of the sources?

• How credible are the sources?

• To what extent do the sources agree with one another?

Lewis Hine Investigative Techniques

“Lewis Hine, a New York City schoolteacher and photographer, believed that a picture could tell a powerful story. He felt so strongly about the abuse of children as workers that he quit his teaching job and became an investigative photographer for the National Child Labor Committee

Hine traveled around the country photographing the working conditions of children in all types of industries such as coal mines, meatpacking houses, textile mills and canneries. He took pictures of children working in the streets as shoe shiners, newsboys and hawkers.

Hine Continued

In many instances, he tricked his way into factories to take the pictures that factory managers did not want the public to see.

He was careful to document every photograph with precise facts and figures. To obtain captions for his pictures, he interviewed the children on some pretext and then scribbled his notes with his hand inside his pocket. Because he used subterfuge to take his photographs, he believed that he had to be “double-sure that my photo data was 100% pure – no retouching or fakery of any kind.”

Hine defined a good photograph as a “reproduction of impressions made upon the photographer which he desires to repeat to others.” Because he realized his photographs were subjective, he described his work as “photo-interpretation.”

Photographs of Lewis Hine: Documentation of Child Labor

Verifying Credibility of Historical Sources

EXAMPLE: Examine the consistency of multiple primary sources in information presented about child labor:

The History Place: Child Labor in America 1908-1912: Photographs of Lewis W. Hinehttp://www.historyplace.com/unitedstates/childlabor/

American Treasures of the Library of Congresshttp://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/trm032.html

National Child Labor Committee Collection: Photographs by Lewis Hine

http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/coll/207-b.html

5. Construct an Argument that Answers the Historical Question

THINK• What evidence best answers the historical

question?

• What thesis statement best fits the evidence?

• How can the evidence be arranged to best support the thesis statement?

THESIS STATEMENT

REVOLUTION, REACTION AND REFORM IN HISTORY

Lewis Hine’s revolutionary use of photo-journalism to investigate child labor in the United States from 1908 to 1912 led to a strong public reaction and support for significant state and federal reforms in the working conditions for American children.

Keating-Owens Child Labor Act of 1916

Arrangement of EvidenceHistory Day Project

1. Working conditions of Child Labor

2. Introduction to Lewis Hine

3. Investigative techniques of Lewis Hine

4. Child labor pictures and reports

5. Child labor reforms and laws