Dorothea Lange

Women Come to the Front:: Journalists, Photographers, and Broadcasters During World War II

Like Esther Bubley, Dorothea Lange (1895-1965) documented the change on the homefront, especially among ethnic groups and workers uprooted by the war. Three months after Pearl Harbor, President Franklin Roosevelt ordered the relocation of Japanese-Americans into armed camps in the West. Soon after, the War Relocation Authority hired Lange to photograph Japanese neighborhoods, processing centers, and camp facilities.

Lange's earlier work documenting displaced farm families and migrant workers during the Great Depression did not prepare her for the disturbing racial and civil rights issues raised by the Japanese internment. Lange quickly found herself at odds with her employer and her subjects' persecutors, the United States government.

To capture the spirit of the camps, Lange created images that frequently juxtapose signs of human courage and dignity with physical evidence of the indignities of incarceration. Not surprisingly, many of Lange's photographs were censored by the federal government, itself conflicted by the existence of the camps.

The true impact of Lange's work was not felt until 1972, when the Whitney Museum incorporated twenty-seven of her photographs into Executive Order 9066, an exhibit about the Japanese internment. New York Times critic A.D. Coleman called Lange's photographs "documents of such a high order that they convey the feelings of the victims as well as the facts of the crime."

The Roots of a Career

[image not available online]
[Dorothea Lange and Paul Taylor on field trip], 1935
Copyright the Dorothea Lange Collection,
The Oakland Museum of California,
The City of Oakland. Gift of Paul S. Taylor (85)

Study of Migrant Workers

[image not available online]
Paul Taylor and Dorothea Lange,
" Again the Covered Wagon,"
Survey Graphic, July 1935, pp. 348-349
General Collections

Prototype for Field Reports on
Great Depression

Paul Taylor and Dorothea Lange,
Migration of Draught Refugees to California,
California State Emergency
Relief Administration,
April 1935, p. 12
Prints and Photographs Division (89)
LOT 897

Lange at Work

[Lange photographing
Japanese-American evacuees],
April 6, 1942
Prints and Photographs Division (89.1)
LC-USZ62-56704

Interrupted Lives

Dorothea Lange,
[Residents of Japanese ancestry
awaiting the bus. . . . ],
April 1942
Prints and Photographs Division (90.1)
LC-USZ62-24654

A Compassionate Eye

Dorothea Lange,
[An early comer. . . .],
June 1942
Prints and Photographs Division (91.1)
LC-USZ62-126937

Salute of Innocence

Dorothea Lange,
[Children of the Weill public school. . . .],
April 1942
Prints and Photographs Division (92)
LC-USZ62-17124

Prelude to the Japanese Exodus

Dorothea Lange,
[Civilian Executive Order No. 5. . . .],
April 1942
Prints and Photographs Division (93)
LC-USZ62-34565

Documenting the Good Life

[image not available online]
"Italians in American Support Allied Cause,"
Victory, Vol.1, No. 4, 1943, pp. 34-35
General Collections (94)

Propaganda Poster Based on Lange Photograph

Dorothea Lange,
"This is America: Keep It Free."
Chicago: Sheldon-Claire, 1942
Prints and Photographs Division (95)

Images Taken Out of Context

Dorothea Lange,
"Close-up: Photographs by Dorothea Lange," Survey Graphic, October 1943,
pp. 392-393
General Collections (96)

Condition of War Workers Profiled

Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams,
"Richmond Took a Beating,"
Fortune, February 1945, p. 262 ff
(page one) (page two) (page three)
General Collections (97)

Impact of Internment Camps Examined

Paul Taylor and Dorothea Lange,
"Our Stakes in the Japanese Exodus,"
Survey Graphic, September 1942,
pp. 373, 374, and 375
General Collections (140)

Library of Congress

DOROTHEA LANGE