Again…breastfeeding in public: No big deal!
Here is a mother hulling berries while she nurses her infant. Her other children sit beside her, also at work. Little Mabel Cuthrie [i.e., Guthrie?], 4 yrs. old started working last year. Location: [Seaford?, Delaware?] May 1910.
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Coal miner’s wife and child. Pursglove, West Virginia. 1938 Sept
Here’s the funny thing about these photos: During this time, it was the poor mothers who stayed fast to the natural art of breastfeeding, whereas metropolitan mothers and those who had better access to health care went to doctors who pushed formula and subsequently convinced them to feed their babies artificially.
Now in 2008, poor, rural mothers statistically do not want to have anything to do with breastfeeding and mothers who are better off economically breastfeed in higher numbers — what a flip-flop.
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One of the aspects of life in the 30s and 40s and before is that breastfeeding was so natural that countless moms breastfed in the midst of families, friends and, yes, even strangers. Look at this mom who breastfed even in full view of a photographer, a veritable stranger, who was hired by the government to take photographs of American life.
This is a coal miner’s wife and child while discussing conditions of house, lack of steady work for husband. Bertha Hill, West Virginia 1938 Sept.
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This is a photo I found in early spring and posted to my personal blog. It’s such a great photo that I had to post it here as well.
Although this photo isn’t dated, I wager a bet it was taken during the mid to late 1930s. It may potentially be the early 1940s. What is particularly telling about this photograph are the notes on the back of the photo (below) and the fact that once again breastfeeding in public was no big deal before the formula industry changed the perception of infant feeding (almost irreparably) in this country. The men could care less that a woman’s exposed breast is in full view of everyone, although the little boy on the right does seem a little enthralled by the baby breastfeeding.
Written Notes on Item
a) Part of Social Hour audience at Shafter Camp (handwritten on reverse); b) Todd’s favorite picture of an “Okie Family” in Shafter F.S.A. Camp. Nursing babies was the usual thing at camp “Socials.” (typed and attached to reverse)
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Migrant mother and child in tent home. Harlingen, Texas 1939 Feb.
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I believe the mother sitting on the bench whose face is partially blocked and is sitting in front of the tree is breastfeeding in public, but I can’t be absolutely sure. What do you think?
Mothers and children in a city park on a hot day, New York City] between ca. 1908 and 1919. Bain News Service photograph.
Tags: breastfeeding in public
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Despite what sometimes feels like hostile reactions toward breastfeeding in public these days, there is a long tradition of nursing in public even though there were decades when mothers were taught to bottle feed as opposed to breastfeed. Here is a photo from May 15, 1916. The title of the photo is “The cornstock madonna” and was taken by Orin Crooker, Hoopeston, Ill.
Tags: breastfeeding in public
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Before I even read the caption for this photograph below, I knew it had to have been taken in the 1940s. How is a mother supposed to bond with her baby by breastfeeding when it’s in another room?
Nurse Aiko Hamaguchi, mother Frances Yokoyama, baby Fukomoto, Manzanar Relocation Center, California, 1943 / Ansel Adams
Tags: 1940s, babies, breastfeeding
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