New photography by Shannon Ruff captured with a digital camera-2007.

A Tobacco Auction In A Warehouse Where Many Caswell County Farmers Sell Their Tobacco

Artist Marion Post Wolcott (American, 1910 - 1990)

CultureAmerican

Date1940

MediumGelatin silver print

DimensionsOverall, Image: 7 1/8 × 9 7/16 in. (18.1 × 24 cm)
Overall: 8 1/16 × 10 in. (20.5 × 25.4 cm)
Overall, Mat: 16 × 20 1/16 in. (40.6 × 51 cm)

Credit LinePurchase, Horace W. Goldsmith Fund

Object number84.78.82

Not on view

DescriptionThis is one of a series of 132 FSA photographs of Virginia; all are gelatin silver prints.

Label TextMarion Post Wolcott American (b. 1910) A Tobacco Auction in a Warehouse Where Many Caswell County Farmers Sell Their Tobacco, Danville, Virginia, October 1940 Gelatin-silver print Museum purchase, Horace W. Goldsmith Fund 84.78.82 Prior to serving as a photographer for the Farm Security Administration, Marion Post served as the first full-time woman staff photographer on the Philadelphia Evening Bulletin. She endured weeks of hazing from the resentful male photographers, who feared her arrival marked the end of their clubby domain. As she later recalled, they "put out their cigarette butts in my developer…and threw spitballs into my cubbyhole darkroom until my aim and speed became better than theirs." To calm the waters and gain her footing, Post proposed a trade: they would train her to develop prints for the newspaper and she would allow them to resume their normal newsroom etiquette. She even embraced their use of four-letter words. That battle, she claimed, prepared her for the emotionally-challenging subjects and travel assignments she later received while working for the FSA. ProvenancePurchased prints from Library of Congress (negatives on file at Library of Congress,) 1984.Exhibition History"Mountaineers to Main Streets: The Old Dominion as seen through the Farm Security Administration Photographs," Large Changing Gallery, Chrysler Museum of Art, May 3 - June 16, 1985. "Women of the Chrysler: a 400-Year Celebration of the Arts," Large Changing Gallery, Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk, Va., March 24 - July 18, 2010.Published ReferencesBrooks Johnson. _Mountaineers to Main Streets: The Old Dominion as seen through the Farm Security Administration Photographs_. The Chrysler Museum, Norfolk, VA. 1985: p. 69.