Hope in Hard Times: New Deal Photographs of Montana, 1936–1942

Arthur Rothstein, Russell Lee, John Vachon, and Marion Post Wolcott became some of the United States’ best-known photographers through their pictures of Depression-era America. Taken between 1936 and 1942, their ­pic­tures of Montana captured the dignity of its people as they struggled to scratch out livings from ­dried-up fields, nurture families in the shadows of Butte head frames, and foster ­communities on the vast expanses of the northern plains. Hope in Hard Times, which features over 140 Farm Security Administration photographs, depicts the many-faceted story of the Great Depression in Montana and the experiences of the ­photographers who documented it. Today these striking images, from cities like Butte to small towns like Terry, present an unforgettable portrait of a little-­studied period in the history of Montana.