TABLE OF CONTENTS
About the Author
Miriam Forman-Brunell is a professor of history, women, and gender at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. She is co-director of Children and Youth in History, author of Babysitter: An American History, and editor of The Girls' History and Culture Readers, among other works.
Girls’ Labor and Leisure in the Progressive Era
“Protest Against Child Labor in a Labor Parade” (1909)
Annotation
This photograph of two girls wearing banners with the slogan “Abolish Child Slavery!!” in English and in Yiddish at a labor parade in New York City, probably on May 1, 1909, documents the high rate of labor activism by girls during the Progressive era.
Not only did girls predominate in the garment industry and toiled in numerous other sectors of the industrial economy, they also worked as labor organizers. Rousing speeches by adolescent girls galvanized workers. Others like Rose Cohen wrote about their experiences as young workers.
Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, Reproduction No. LC-DIG-ppmsca-06591. “Protest Against Child Labor in a Labor Parade.” Accessed September 26, 2012.