A Car Load of Texas Corn 1905 - 1915

Curator: Well, what strikes me immediately about this print, titled "A Car Load of Texas Corn," is its almost mythical quality. It feels like an illustration from a folk tale. Editor: Mythical is interesting! My first thought was that it's unsettlingly celebratory, almost bordering on propaganda. All that corn – but for whom, and at what cost? Curator: It’s by George B. Cornish, dated sometime between 1905 and 1915, placing it squarely in a period of significant agricultural development, but the presentation is far from documentary. The symbolic weight of the corn as a signifier of prosperity, especially in a landscape like Texas, feels very pronounced. I notice, though, how the photograph has a muted tonal palette, contributing to a strong emphasis on texture; everything in this landscape looks touchable. Editor: The monochrome certainly gives it an aged feel, but I can’t help seeing that exaggerated size as part of a larger narrative of industrialization, consumerism, and maybe even exploitation. The size of that ear of corn on that rail car reminds us about American capacity at the time, but I question what that kind of production means for the human bodies who manage such huge harvests, especially considering Texas' complicated relationship with labor in that period. How are human hands included or erased from the myth that the photo is proposing? Curator: Those are critical questions. Though the sheer scale might signal dominance, there’s also something timeless about the image itself, as if we're viewing an emblem, one whose resonance persists. Editor: Maybe we’re looking at a document of mythmaking itself—an archive of aspiration or perhaps warning of excess. Thanks for the illuminating observation! Curator: Thanks! I will definitely never see corn the same way again.