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Today's final book recommendation for Women's History Month is "Dorothea Lange: A Photographer’s Life" by Milton Meltzer (1978).
Dorothea Lange is widely recognized as one of the great documentary photographers. Her iconic photographs of migrant workers in the 1930's, and interned Japanese-Americans in the 1940's, have been seen by millions of people. Just one of her photos, "Migrant Mother", is one of the best-known images of the 20th century.
This book introduces us to the woman behind the photographs. Raised by a single mother after her father abandoned the family, she contracted polio as a child, and walked with a limp for the rest of her life. She decided in her late teens that she wanted to be a photographer, before she even owned a camera. In the 1920's, she moved to California, where she made a living as a portrait photographer.
In 1933, Lange was employed by the New Deal to document in pictures the situation of migrant workers during the Great Depression. This changed the trajectory of her career, as she discovered her calling to documentary photography.
She went on to photograph migrant workers on the roads, Japanese-Americans in internment camps, and sharecroppers in the south. Until her death in 1965, she remained an influence in the world of documentary photography, with numerous later photographers citing her as an early inspiration.
Link to book:
https://press.syr.edu/supressbooks/1336/dorothea-lange/