Work - Overview
The tools, rules, and relationships of the workplace illustrate some of the enduring collaborations and conflicts in the everyday life of the nation. The Museum has more than 5,000 traditional American tools, chests, and simple machines for working wood, stone, metal, and leather. Materials on welding, riveting, and iron and steel construction tell a more industrial version of the story. Computers, industrial robots, and other artifacts represent work in the Information Age.
But work is more than just tools. The collections include a factory gate, the motion-study photographs of Frank and Lillian Gilbreth, and more than 3,000 work incentive posters. The rise of the factory system is measured, in part, by time clocks in the collections. More than 9,000 items bring in the story of labor unions, strikes, and demonstrations over trade and economic issues.
"Work - Overview" showing 1731 items.
Page 1 of 174
Plate 70. Army Repair Shop
- Description
- Text and photograph from Gardner's Photographic Sketchbook of the War, Vol. II. Negative by Timothy H. O'Sullivan, text and positive by Alexander Gardner.
- In such rude manner did the lusty artificers of the corps carry on their needful trades, doing much good work under the scorching rays of the southern sun. At one time the majority of these hardy workmen were detailed from the ranks, with extra pay and allowances, but when every soldier was needed behind his musket, skilled men were hired for such duty, and some of the soldiers ordered back to their regiments. On the right of the view is the stocks, a neat contrivance, to facilitate the shoeing of mules, an operation which those self-willed animals had a decided objection to undergo. Time being precious, the farriers could not be expected to waste much in the exercise of their persuasive abilities. The refractory mule was led into the stocks, often by the seductive display of a peck of oats, suddenly to find himself suspended in air upon a huge belly-band. Four stout fellows seizing his feet, fastened them securely with thongs in the required position, and while impotent rage convulsed his frame, rapidly nailed on the shoes, finally releasing the hybrid in a state of wretched uncertainty as to the intents and purposes of his masters.
- The tent fly, with its partial walls of loose bricks, covers the forge. Around it are the wheel and harness-makers, evidently resting, with pleasing expectations of forming a prominent feature of the photograph, while the contrabands have assumed positions of determined fixedness, worthy of the occasion.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1864-02
- maker
- Gardner, Alexander
- ID Number
- 1986.0711.0283.20
- accession number
- 1986.0711
- catalog number
- 1986.0711.0283.20
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Plate 77. Army Forge Scene
- Description
- Text and photograph from Gardner's Photographic Sketchbook of the War, Vol. II. Negative by David Knox, text and positive by Alexander Gardner.
- This photograph represents one of the forges used by the army at Petersburg, and was taken during the intense heat of a summer day. The trees in the distance are dimly seen through the tremulous air, and the pine twigs droop from the eaves of the but as if a fire had scorched them. The hoofs of the horse are buried in burning dust, and the boots of the men are loaded with powdered earth. By the tall pine in the back-ground, a little tent seems to be vainly seeking the shadow, while over all glares a hot sky, without a cloud to relieve the weary eyes. The parched ground and arid appearance of the landscape was characteristic of the country about Petersburg, where the constant movements of troops crushed out vegetation. Forests, houses, and fences were swept away, and the fields were transformed into vast commons, where the winds raised clouds of sand, and covered everything with the sacred soil. On these glaring deserts, with no covering but the shelter tent and withered brush, the army toiled and fought through many months, filling the valleys with graves, and sapping the vigor of men in the prime of life. Many are the dead that might now be living but for the poison of those torrid days, and all through the land are feeble veterans, who look back upon that campaign as does the pilgrim on his journeyings across the great Sahara.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date made
- 1864-08
- maker
- Gardner, Alexander
- ID Number
- 1986.0711.0283.27
- accession number
- 1986.0711
- catalog number
- 1986.0711.0283.27
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Braceros Waiting at Processing Center
- Description
- Photograph: Beyond railroad tracks, braceros wait in a large group for processing at the Monterrey Processing Center, Mexico.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date photographed
- 1956
- photographer
- Nadel, Leonard
- ID Number
- 2004.0138.01.01
- accession number
- 2004.0138
- catalog number
- 2004.0138.01.01
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Braceros on Railroad Tracks
- Description
- Photograph: Braceros stand beside railroad tracks while waiting to enter the Monterrey Processing Center, Mexico.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date photographed
- 1956
- photographer
- Nadel, Leonard
- ID Number
- 2004.0138.01.02
- accession number
- 2004.0138
- catalog number
- 2004.0138.01.02
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Braceros on Railroad Tracks
- Description
- Photograph: Braceros stand beside railroad tracks while waiting to enter the Monterrey Processing Center, Mexico.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date photographed
- 1956
- photographer
- Nadel, Leonard
- ID Number
- 2004.0138.01.03
- accession number
- 2004.0138
- catalog number
- 2004.0138.01.03
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Braceros at Processing Center
- Description
- Photograph: Beyond barbed wire, an official armed with a rubber truncheon directs braceros while others wait in line at the Monterrey Processing Center, Mexico.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date photographed
- 1956
- photographer
- Nadel, Leonard
- ID Number
- 2004.0138.01.04
- accession number
- 2004.0138
- catalog number
- 2004.0138.01.04
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Braceros Waiting at Processing Center
- Description
- Photograph: Braceros, holding their belongings, wait in lines organized by state of origin at the Monterrey Processing Center, Mexico.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date photographed
- 1956
- photographer
- Nadel, Leonard
- ID Number
- 2004.0138.01.05
- accession number
- 2004.0138
- catalog number
- 2004.0138.01.05
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Reviewing Braceros' Documents
- Description
- Photograph: An official standing in a wooden shed reviews one bracero's documents while more wait in line at the Monterrey Processing Center, Mexico.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date photographed
- 1956
- photographer
- Nadel, Leonard
- ID Number
- 2004.0138.01.06
- accession number
- 2004.0138
- catalog number
- 2004.0138.01.06
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Reviewing Braceros' Documents
- Description
- Photograph: An official standing in a wooden shed reviews one bracero's documents while more wait in line at the Monterrey Processing Center, Mexico.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date photographed
- 1956
- photographer
- Nadel, Leonard
- ID Number
- 2004.0138.01.07
- accession number
- 2004.0138
- catalog number
- 2004.0138.01.07
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center
Reviewing Braceros' Documents
- Description
- Photograph: An official standing in a wooden shed reviews one bracero's documents while more wait in line at the Monterrey Processing Center, Mexico.
- Location
- Currently not on view
- date photographed
- 1956
- photographer
- Nadel, Leonard
- ID Number
- 2004.0138.01.08
- accession number
- 2004.0138
- catalog number
- 2004.0138.01.08
- Data Source
- National Museum of American History, Kenneth E. Behring Center