A Thanksgiving Feast -- CARLI Digital Collections Featured Image

Thanksgiving is upon us. The local grocery stores feature prominent displays of cranberries, sweet potatoes and cans of pumpkin pie filling, and I am making a list of the ingredients I need for my apple pies—my annual contribution to the family dinner.

As I look forward to the upcoming holiday, I thought I would search the digital collections to see what turned up for a search for Thanksgiving, and I discovered this touching photo titled “A Thanksgiving Feast.” The photo is dated c. 1913 and captures children seated at two long rows of tables set for their Thanksgiving dinner. Each place setting includes a bowl and cup, an apple and what appears to be a piece of bread. What I love about the photo is the air of expectation. Many of the children stare curiously at the camera, and both the children and adults standing behind them all seem to be waiting for someone to give the signal so they can begin to eat.

In the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, Chicago’s settlement houses provided important social services to recent European immigrants. The influence of settlement houses waned by the mid-twentieth century as other service models took their place. This photo, however, is from the records of the Off the Street Club, which still exists today and is Chicago’s oldest boys and girls club.

Written by Alice Creason, Systems/Digital Collections Librarian at Lewis University

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