Two children share a bed, their pillow made from a flour sack.

Location

Location Unconfirmed

Year

c. 1920–1921

Item Detail

The pillow is covered with a Commander flour sack, the brand still printed on the cloth. Another caption in the same album explains that, with clothing scarce, "flour sacks and every piece of cloth on hand" were put to use.

Context

The American Relief Administration (ARA), Herbert Hoover's relief agency in postwar Europe, was re-formed in July 1919 as a volunteer, non-profit body. From August 1919 to July 1920 it worked jointly with Near East Relief in the Caucasus under Colonel William N. Haskell, joint relief administrator and high commissioner for Armenia. Near East Relief agreed to pay the administrative, orphanage and transportation costs, and its workers took their assignments from Haskell and ran the orphanages. The people they served included Armenian refugees who had fled Turkey during the Armenian Genocide. When Haskell withdrew to Constantinople in 1920, Ernest A. Yarrow took charge of the workers who stayed.

This photograph is one of 67 prints from the ARA European operational records at the Hoover Institution Library & Archives. Seven show child feeding and institutions in Tiflis (Tbilisi). Nineteen filed as ARA operations in Armenia are mostly marked "Near East Relief" on the back, and one is an American Red Cross photograph. Four more, filed as starving children, are marked as Armenian refugees and an Armenian child. Thirty-seven come from an album that Hoover describes as work of Near East Relief in Erevan. Its captions also name places in Georgia and Turkey.

View in the Digital Archive

  • Holding Institution

    Hoover Institution Library and Archives

  • External Link
    https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/tf9779p02m_aspace_d508570211510b5474ee72ab3afb4b0f

  • Attribution

    Photograph of two children with a flour-sack pillow, c. 1920–1921, American Relief Administration European operational records, Box 855, Folder 11, Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

  • Rights

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  • Notes

    No album caption was found for this print. On the print: "COMMANDER FLOUR" on the pillow.

    Hoover title: "Album containing 37 prints depicting work of Near East Relief in Erevan." Box 855, Folder 11 (Armenia). Hoover record: https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/tf9779p02m_aspace_d508570211510b5474ee72ab3afb4b0f

    Sources for the Item Detail:

    • Album caption on another page of the same album, page shot asset 11105 ("Owing to the scarcity of clothing ... flour sacks and every piece of cloth on hand is utilized.").

    About this group: American Relief Administration European operational records, Hoover Institution Library & Archives.

    • Hoover Institution Library & Archives, American Relief Administration European operational records, collection guide, biographical note quoting Herbert Hoover, An American Epic, vol. III ("to set up a volunteer successor under the same name" ... "On July 12, they formed the new American Relief Administration, which was registered as a non-profit corporation"): https://oac.cdlib.org/findaid/ark:/13030/tf9779p02m

    • Barton, p. 124 ("the appointment of Col. William N. Haskell as joint relief administrator and high commissioner for Armenia ... The Near East Relief agreed to pay all administrative, orphanage and transportation charges, which were estimated at $500,000 per month."). James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679

    • Barton, p. 124 ("Col. Haskell and his mission took charge of the relief activities in August, 1919, and remained in the Caucasus until July, 1920. The Near East Relief workers were given assignments by Col. Haskell and were made responsible for the care of the children and the orphanages."). James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679

    • Barton, p. 10 ("It was learned that Armenians from the eastern part of Turkey, alarmed by the hostile attitude of the Constantinople government, were in exodus by the tens of thousands into Russia" ... "there was an assemblage of more than two hundred thousand Armenians, Assyrians and Nestorians in abject destitution in the Russian Caucasus"), from the State Department dispatches the committee read when it was formed in 1915. James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679

    • Barton, p. 127 ("Col. Haskell and his military aids withdrew to Constantinople and Ernest A. Yarrow was placed in charge of the civilian workers, who remained to carry on the relief activities."). James L. Barton, Story of Near East Relief (1930), HathiTrust: http://hdl.handle.net/2027/uc1.$b744679

Two children share a bed, their pillow made from a flour sack.