Poor in America (1936) Lucille Burroughs, Daughter of a cotton sharecropper in Hale Count
Poor in America (1936) Lucille Burroughs, Daughter of a cotton sharecropper in Hale County Alabama, the Summer Of 1936 Sharecroppers, were even more impoverished than tenant farmers. With few resources and little or no cash, sharecroppers agreed to farm a certain plot of land in exchange for a share of the crops they raised. Alabama’s rural landscape was an economic and social tragedy. A 1940 statewide survey valued the dwellings of white rural landowners at only $681 and those of black and white tenants at barely half that amount. Only 1.4 percent of these rural houses contained running water, 0.7 percent a flush toilet, 11.6 percent a refrigerator, and 19.9 percent a radio. Rural houses by and large were dilapidated, unsightly, unpainted, and unscreened, with leaky roofs and outdoor toilets—if they had any toilets at all. Electricity was just beginning to appear in rural communities. As late as the 1960 Census, 28 of Alabama’s 67 counties had poverty rates of 20 percent or more, with children under age 18 most likely to be poor. Evans, Walker, 1903-1975, photographer, second photo-Home of cotton sharecropper Floyd Borroughs. Hale County, Alabama, Farm Security Administration - Office of War Information Photograph Collection (Library of Congress) -- source link
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