Louisville Flood the Photograph \"The Louisville Flood\"

¶ … Louisville Flood

The photograph "The Louisville Flood" by Margaret Bourke-White is a courageous and accurate representation of the injustices that are perpetuated in American society today and which have been a part of our history for decades. The title of the photograph refers to the Ohio River Flood of 1937 in which from January to February damage occurred from Pennsylvania to Illinois. One need to only look at the facts to determine how devastating the damage of this flood in fact was: "Seventy percent of Louisville was submerged, forcing 175,000 residents to flee. Ninety percent of Jeffersonville, Indiana was flooded. One contemporary source estimated that damage was done to the tune of $250,000,000 (1937 dollars)...that's over $3.3 billion in current dollars!!" (National Weather Service, 2012). Thus, one can clearly see how residents in this part of the world were in dire need of aid and lots of it. In 1937, race relations in America were still raucous and left much to be desired. In the south, where Bourke-White's photograph was taken, was a region of the country where racism was as prevalent as ever and African-Americans still lacked the same opportunities as their white counterparts, and were often treated as second class citizens. Such circumstances in treatments caused Black Americans at this time to earn less, have lower standards of quality of life and lower levels of safety, what with the presence of the Ku Klux Klan still prevalent.

Bourke-White's Black and white photograph shows a one-point perspective of African-Americans in heavy overcoats and other outer wear, lined up single file for aid. The expressions on their faces are sedate, troubled, one could even say expressing deep unhappiness. What makes the photograph so striking is that these honest and hard-working African-Americans are standing in front of an enormous billboard for a purely patriotic advertisement for simply the "American Way of Living." The billboard is so enormous; it appears to fill an entire wall of the exterior of a side of a building. The advertisement contrast sharply with the muted expressions and mild atmosphere of hopelessness that the line of African-Americans demonstrates. The advertisement shows a beaming representation of a Caucasian family of four driving in a brand new car: the father sits behind the wheel, the mother is in the passenger seat and their daughter and son sit in the backseat with a clean white dog beside them. All members of the family are beaming; even the dog is cheerfully sticking his head out the window. The family looks as though they're off on some adventure of fun and excitement where they'll have good fortune and safe, easy travels. The title at the top of the advertisement proclaims: "World's Highest Standard of Living." At the bottom of the advertisement in large cursive writing the words, "There's no way like the American way." The contrast between the cheerful, privileged, safe and taken care of white family in the advertisement is dramatic between the disadvantaged, unsafe, poor and seemingly hopeless African-Americans waiting in what appears to be an endless line. The line that the African-Americans are forced to stand in seems like an example of the most flawed and bureaucratic and ineffective part of the "American way." It appears as the Bourke-White's photograph attempts to demonstrate that the American way only benefits white Americans and suggests that the American all but fails black Americans completely.