Lewis Hine American, 1874-1940 Lewis Hine (born in Oshkosh, Wisconsin) was known for his photographs of early 20th-century immigrants, child laborers, and industrial workers. Trained as a sociologist, he used his camera as a tool for social reform, creating a body of work reflective of his own humanistic vision and commitment to social justice. Around 1903, while working as an instructor at the Ethical Culture School in New York City, Hine began experimenting with photography and the following year undertook his first major project: recording newcomers to America as they entered through Ellis Island. Interested in countering prejudice against immigrants, he portrayed them with dignity and compassion. In 1907 Hine joined the Pittsburgh Survey, a pioneering sociological study documenting the living and working conditions of Pittsburgh's industrial workers, and the following year began work as an investigator and photographer for the National Child Labor Committee. Over the next eight years he traveled thousands of miles, photographing children in mills, mines, canneries, tenement sweatshops, and on the street. Toward the end of World War I, Hine photographed overseas for the American Red Cross and in the 1920s began Work Portraits, a photographic series focusing on American workers. In 1930 he received a commission to photograph the construction of the Empire State Building, and a number of images from this project and from Work Portraits appeared in his 1932 book Men at Work. During the last decade of his life Hine worked for the Rural Electrical Administration, the Tennessee Valley Authority, and the Work Projects Administration. In 1939 his photographs were featured in a retrospective exhibition at the Riverside Museum, New York. M.M.