Digital Repository

Young Oyster Shuckers, Port Royal, South Carolina, 1909

A number of social reforms were made or begun during Theodore Roosevelt's time in office. Although child labor, as depicted here, was not outlawed during his administration, it was during the early 1900s that the American public first became widely aware of the scope of the problem and began to raise an outcry against it. This resulted in the establishment of organizations such as the National Child Labor Committee, in 1904, which led the fight against child labor.

Young Oyster Shuckers, Port Royal, South Carolina, 1909. Photograph by Lewis Hine. Prints and Photographs Division, Library of Congress.