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Uncle Essick. One of Eickemeyer's most famous photographs, this image of an old man with pipe in hand and looking over his shoulder at the camera is carefully posed and highly romanticized. This man personifies all the nostalgic qualities of those "good and polite farmers" who lived through slavery and struggled in freedom. For Eickemeyer, slavery was remembered fondly as a time when blacks "never had a care," at least this is what the artist once wrote about them in a letter to his father. This picture was taken in Alabama c1894-1900. Published in Down South, New York: R. H. Russell, 1900.	Who's Dat. This image appears on the cover of Eickemeyer's book Down South. With it the artist lays out his romanticized approach to depicting rural blacks of the postbellum South. The picture presents the quiet dignity of those formerly enslaved people of the old South who lived in the generation after the Civil War. Although all of these pictures were taken in rural Alabama in the 1890s, thirty years after slavery's end, the artist hopes to show how individuals lived through slavery and emerged into freedom with their honor and humanity fully intact. Notice the clean clothes worn by the woman and child, the healthy and clean-looking puppy, the sturdy and well-used broom. The woman with broom in hand is a hard-working mother; and she is somewhat judgmental about the old stranger walking up the road. What do you think Eickemeyer is trying to convey with this image? With this title to the picture? Notice the fence. The ruts in the road. The tip of a cabin roof in the background. As with all of his images, Eickemeyer contrasts the difficulties of life for blacks in the rural South with the strength of their characters. The image is filled with the vestiges of slavery but romanticized and softened. This picture was taken in Alabama c1894-1900. Published in Down South, New York: R. H. Russell, 1900.	Returning From The Field. Eickemeyer captures the physical and mental fatigue of this woman as she returns from a day's work in the field picking cotton. Her dress is as worn as her face, and though she is weary she is determined. Several aspects of this picture show the artist's willingness to distort reality in order to capture a larger truth. The woman's basket is empty, suggesting that she has already emptied its contents of picked cotton. In reality, the basket would have been left in the field for tomorrow's work rather than taken back to her cabin. And hoes were seldom needed during the cotton-picking season. But such details do not distract from the reality of the woman's fatigue or the character of her face. Notice the strong hands, the sturdy but much used shoe, and the beaten path she trods. Every detail in this picture speaks of a nobility of character in a stark setting. Eickemeyer is one of the first photographers to try to convey the idea that blacks were ennobled by having simply survived slavery and its aftermath. This picture was taken in Alabama c1894-1900. Published in Down South, New York: R. H. Russell, 1900.
The Plantation Well. Every plantation had a cistern or well that collected water from the roofs of the plantation buildings. Here Eickemeyer presents an almost biblical scene of workers gathered at the well doing what peasants and rural folk have done for centuries. Notice the ramrod straight posture of the woman with the jar of water on her head. The older woman looks resigned to her plight in life as she pours water from the bucket while the lad looks on, allowing the viewer to see his tattered clothes and worn shoes. What feelings are evoked in the viewer by presenting this image in this way? Can you guess the season of the year? This picture was taken in Alabama c1894-1900. Published in Down South, New York: R. H. Russell, 1900.	The Thanksgiving Turkey. Here Eickemeyer connects the life of rural blacks to the American mainstream by showing this woman plucking feathers from a turkey in preparation of a feast to celebrate the great American holiday: Thanksgiving. Clearly, this picture makes the black South very much a part of white America. Yet there is no joy in the woman's face. In fact, Eickemeyer seldom shows his subjects in moments of joy or happiness. It is almost as if he is trying to counter the stereotypical image of the happy-go-lucky "darky" that filled the popular imagination of Jim Crow America. Notice, too, that the people are always clean and modestly dressed. What do you make of the young man watching the woman with the bird? What is Eickemeyer trying to get us to see and to feel by showing him in this stance? What is in his hand? This picture was taken in Alabama c1894-1900. Published in Down South, New York: R. H. Russell, 1900.	The Great House. The weary but dutiful house servant presented here, is dressed in the typical clothes of enslaved and free black women who worked for whites in their estate and plantation mansions. One of the most common duties performed was sweeping the walks and lawns that surrounded the prestigious mansion houses built out of the profits made from owning and working enslaved people. This house dates from the era of slavery, and it was once a grand and well-kept showplace. Here it has fallen on hard times. The house needs painting and its sideboards and steps could use some repair. Almost everything in the South that was rich and palatial is falling down in the aftermath of slavery. Yet, this black woman labors on much as she or her mother had worked in the days before the Civil War. Notice the vine that encircles the front porch and its pillars, probably a wisteria vine. Why do you think that almost all of the images in his book are taken in the late autumn or winter months? If Eickemeyer had taken this picture in spring, the wisteria vine would have been resplendent in blooms of purple and white flowers. Can you identify the style of the porch columns? Is there anything to be said here about the image of the woman looking down at the ground with the rising columns at her back, worn and weather-beaten columns that reflect a copied style and look of what ancient past? This picture was taken in Alabama c1894-1900. Published in Down South, New York: R. H. Russell, 1900.

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