The Twins from 1924

The Twins, 1924, Cledenon, Arkansas


My next door neighbor owns the consolidated picture of these children from 1924 (93 years ago) and asked me if I could do anything with the picture. The picture was in decent shape. I scanned it into my photos, cleaned it up achieved the first result. He and his wife pointed out their relations and I simply cropped the picture and captured them. The top girl and boy were twins. Life in Arkansas was simple back in those days.

Notice that most of the children don't have shoes. They only wore them, if indeed they had any during the winter. During cotton season children this old left school and went to the fields and helped pick the cotton. Some of my friends did this back breaking work up through the 1950s. There is a Cotton Museum in Scott, AR and one can see examples of how folks, black and white worked the fields.

One thing I noted is that they all appear healthy and robust. The smiles on their faces tell so many stories. In the small photo grouping the little girl in the front has so many freckles you can't count them. Even though they were poor they had to enjoy many things that kids do when they are that age.