Winter Landscape c. 1900

George Timmins made this small photograph of a midwestern farm in winter sometime around the turn of the twentieth century. The family home sits relatively close to us, a picket fence creating a boundary between its domestic space and the landscape beyond. The image is striking because it represents a period of transition in American society. Here we see an echo of agrarian life at a time when industrial capitalism was beginning to dominate. How did rural communities understand their relationship to the burgeoning urban centers? Was the farm a place of comfort or a site of isolation? What role did photography play in shaping perceptions of the countryside? These are some of the questions that might be addressed by historians. We might consult census data, period literature, and photographic journals in an effort to better understand the cultural context of this deceptively simple image.