WP1: Pre Writing 1

This photograph is of “Beecher Street School, whose student body consists of half Americans of Italian descent and half of Americans of Polish descent, Southington, Conn.” and was taken in May of 1942. The people in the photograph are the students that go to this school, who seem to be watching the festival in which the May royalty is announced, and the title of the photograph tells us that “The Queen of the May was Emily Schwak, of Polish extraction; the King, Philip D'Agostino, of Italian.” This information further indicates that the school is indeed split in half in the case of its ethnic population that half are of Italian heritage and half of Polish. This influenced me quite a bit when I first looked at the photograph because of the assumptions that I made about the students that are shown in the photograph.

Right away I noticed the girl sitting on a chair in the middle because she is in the foreground of the photo and she also seems to be the object that is most in focus in the photograph. The other characters in the background are slightly blurry but they are still a major spot of attention. Although the girl is separated from the other students, I still assume that she is part of their class. However, from the information that the title gives a description of, I also assume that she is as student who is of Polish descent and the other students behind her are of Italian descent. This is a judgment of physical characteristics and I could be wrong but it is just my assumption from my own knowledge.

Even though the one girl is separated from the others, I do not sense that there is an unfriendly reason for this, that it is simply a matter of cultural and background differences. This is not to say that I think this is always that case, that the students of two different ethnicities do not ever mingle or get along, but from this point of view, it seems that the girl is by herself among a group of students that are different from her and she may have chosen to just remain sitting on her own. However, I cannot see the rest of the street and the road that is on either side of the girl so I do not know for certain whether or not she is surrounded by others or if there are just people grouped up behind her.

The students in the back seem to be of the Italian group that the picture description mentioned, as I said before. One of the first things I noticed when I looked at them was that they are holding up two signs, one of which I’m not clear on what the purpose is. The victory garden sign’s purpose is obvious when the date the picture was taken is taken into context. The United States had entered WWII and efforts to support the economy in a time of warfare were widespread across the country. The breakfast-lunch sign is less obvious to me as to the meaning, I’m not sure if it is related to the victory garden or if it is something separate.

This picture to me captures a moment that the children are waiting for something to begin or to continue in this festival that is celebrating the queen and king of the May. The weather to me seems to be warm and maybe a bit breezy because the children don’t look uncomfortable because of heat if not just because of the sun in their eyes. This photograph exudes the anxiousness that one feels when waiting for something exciting to happen, and I look forward to continuing to analyze this photo.