Pic-A-Day (999) Albert Mach Fine Art

July 1936 - Vernon Evans moving

Here is a historical picture from years gone by.

The 1930s were very hard times the country was in the throes of the depression and at the same time, America was hit with a drought. In the mid west this lead to the dust bowls from farming practices that had been in place. The dust storms killed the crops and to make matters worse, hoards of starving grasshoppers ate what was left. Millions of people lost their homes and many of the farmers headed west to Washington, Oregon, and California for work.

Arthur Rothstein documented the lives of these migrant familes in a many photographs from 1936. This image of Vernon Evans from Lemmon, South Dakota was taken on Highway 10 near Missoula, Montana. Mr. Evans had packed his family into their car and was heading to Washington’s Yakima Valley in hopes of finding seasonal work picking hops.

The trip was over 1000 miles with them covering about 200 miles a day. The family slept in tents along the way.

Image from the Library of congress.

Here is a transcribed interview of Vernon Evens submitted by a fellow named Dave from Shorpy.

http://www.shorpy.com/node/13549#comment-140245

An interview with Vernon Evans (at center in photo) about how this and several other pictures came to be taken:

Well, we was all without jobs here [in South Dakota]. And the jobs was so few and far between at the time we left that you couldn't even buy a job. We had friends that we knew out in Oregon, and we decided we was going to go out there and see if we could find some work. We had $54 between the five of us when we started out from here to go to Oregon. And when we got to Oregon, I think we had about $16 left. We had absolutely no idea what we was going to do.

We all got in an old Model T and started for Oregon. We started out, and, I don't know, we got out six miles and broke the crankshaft. This old rancher, he had some old Model T motors laying around. He said we was welcome to a crankshaft if we wanted one. So, we went back and proceeded to tear the motor out of the old Model T and put the crankshaft in. And that night we made Baker, which is a matter of 24 miles from the night before.

Well, then we had pretty good luck all the rest of the way. But we got around Missoula [Montana] and we was having a good time. See somebody along the road or something. And here was this car sitting alongside the road, and a guy sleeping in it. So, we honked and hollered at him, having a good time. Pretty soon, this car was after us. We'd heard they was sending them back [police sending migrants back at state borders], wasn't letting 'em go on through. So, we thought, "Well, here's where we go back home." He motioned for us to pull over to the side of the road.

Anyhow, he come up and introduced himself [as Arthur Rothstein] and said he was with the Resettlement Administration and asked us questions about the conditions here and one thing or another. Where we was headed for. This "Oregon or Bust" on the back end was what took his eye. Then, he asked us if we cared if he took some pictures of us. Oh, we said, "I guess not." I think he took eight different poses. And then after we was out there [in Oregon] I guess probably it was that fall or winter, why these pictures started showing up in the different magazines and papers. Anyhow, we got out there and I went to work on the railroad.