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A More Perfect Union

The New Georgia Encyclopedia is supported by funding from A More Perfect Union, a special initiative of the National Endowment for the Humanities.

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Schoolchildren in Lunch Line

Schoolchildren in Lunch Line

Schoolchildren stand in line for lunch at an unidentified school in Georgia. Photograph taken by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, circa 1955.

Georgia Schoolchildren at Lunch

Georgia Schoolchildren at Lunch

Two students eat lunch at an unidentified school in Georgia. Photograph taken by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, circa 1955.

Schoolchildren in Manhattan

Schoolchildren in Manhattan

Schoolchildren at P.S. 51 in Manhattan stand in line for free lunch in the early 1900s. During the school year of 1901-2, New York spent approximately $42 per student annually. In comparison, Georgia spent only around $7. The South's segregated school system further exacerbated budget issues and limited funding for the separate education of African American children.

Courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division

School Lunches Pamphlet

School Lunches Pamphlet

The pamphlet "School Lunches" was published by the Bureau of Education, U.S. Department of the Interior, in 1919.

Courtesy of Department of Government Documents, University of Georgia Libraries

Children Threshing Corn

Children Threshing Corn

Two boys in Laurens County thrash corn, circa 1915. During the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, the United States was largely an agrarian society. Since many families in the South needed their children at home to help with crop production, the summer break from school originally corresponded with the growing season.

Courtesy of Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division

School Lunch Poster

School Lunch Poster

The War Food Administration produced the "Every Child Needs a Good School Lunch" poster in 1944.

Courtesy of National Archives and Records Administration

Troup County Schoolchildren

Troup County Schoolchildren

Schoolchildren in Troup County pose during lunch with school superintendent J. H. Melson in December 1944.

Courtesy of Georgia Archives, Lamar Q. Ball Collection, #lball0152.

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Richard B. Russell Jr.

Richard B. Russell Jr.

Richard B. Russell Jr., pictured in 1955, was an ardent supporter of the National School Lunch Program.

Courtesy of Richard B. Russell Library for Political Research and Studies, University of Georgia Libraries, Photograph by Merkle Press, Richard B. Russell, Jr. Collection..

The School That Learned to Eat

Produced by the University of Georgia College of Education and General Mills, The School That Learned to Eat (1948) is a short film chronicling a community's efforts to improve the school lunch program at East Griffin Elementary School in Spalding County. 

Truman Signs School Lunch Bill

Truman Signs School Lunch Bill

With U.S. senator Richard B. Russell Jr. (third from left) looking on, Senator Allen J. Ellender hands a pen to President Harry Truman on June 4, 1946, to sign legislation creating the National School Lunch Program.

School Lunch Brochure

School Lunch Brochure

The U.S. Department of Agriculture published the brochure "Participation of Negro Children in School Lunch Programs" in 1951.

School Lunchroom

School Lunchroom

Students and their teacher eat lunch at a school in Eatonton, circa 1952.

Courtesy of Georgia Archives, Vanishing Georgia, #
put246.

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School Lunchroom

School Lunchroom

Schoolchildren drink milk during lunch at a school in Georgia, circa 1950.

Baldowski Cartoon: Georgia’s Peanut Industry

Baldowski Cartoon: Georgia’s Peanut Industry

A 1952 cartoon by Clifford H. "Baldy" Baldowski depicts a farmer blowing a large horn labeled "Georgia's Peanut Industry." Emerging from the horn are peanuts labeled "350,000 tons annually," "$75,000,000 Industry," "No. 2 Crop in State," "Nation's Leading Producer," "Local Processing Plants."Atlanta Constitution, 1952, Clifford H. "Baldy" Baldowski Cartoons.

Maston O’Neal

Maston O’Neal

Maston O'Neal, who served as a U.S. representative from Georgia in the late 1960s, samples peanut butter recipes for school lunches during the congressional observance of National Peanut Week in 1970.

D. W. Brooks

D. W. Brooks

D. W. Brooks observes the chicken processing line at the Gold Kist factory in Canton, circa 1978. Brooks led Gold Kist, an Atlanta-based farm cooperative, for forty-seven years.

Talmadge on Hunger Tour of Georgia

Talmadge on Hunger Tour of Georgia

U.S. senator Herman Talmadge (seated, far left) is pictured during a stop on the Hunger Tour across Georgia in 1969.

Courtesy of Bill Collins. Photograph provided by South Carolina Press Association Archives

Baldowski Cartoon: Hunger Tour

Baldowski Cartoon: Hunger Tour

This 1968 cartoon by Clifford H. "Baldy" Baldowski depicts U.S. senator Strom Thurmond of South Carolina walking past ramshackle houses and stepping over poor African American children while declaring,  "Poverty? Ah been walkin' these woods all my life an' ah never see no poverty." Meanwhile South Carolina senator Ernest Hollings points to the problems while holding papers that read "South Carolina's Severe Hunger Problem." In 1969 Hollings took a "hunger tour" through South Carolina as part of his service on the McGovern Committee. U.S. senator Herman Talmadge of Georgia conducted a similar tour in his home state and soon thereafter introduced legislation to strengthen the National School Lunch Program.Atlanta Constitution, 1968, Clifford H. "Baldy" Baldowski Editorial Cartoons.

School Lunch Participation

School Lunch Participation

In 1975 more than 19 percent of U.S. schoolchildren received free or reduced-price lunch through the National School Lunch Program.

From "The National School Lunch Program—Is It Working?" by the Departments of Agriculture and Health, Education, and Welfare

Herblock Cartoon: School Lunches

Herblock Cartoon: School Lunches

The 1995 Herblock cartoon "We've got to—chomp chomp—stop spending money on things like school lunches" comments on the lack of funding for the National School Lunch Program.

A 1995 Herblock Cartoon, ©The Herb Block Foundation

Attorney General Arthur Bolton on School Lunch Financing

A WSB-TV reporter gathers opinions on February 7, 1967, regarding the ruling of Georgia attorney general Arthur Bolton to suspend state financing for the school lunch program.

State Financing for School Lunches

In an interview on January 18, 1967, a woman explains to a reporter from WSB-TV in Atlanta her views on state financing for school lunches.

Bringing Local to the Lunchroom: The Farm to School Strategy

In March 2013 a student journalist at the University of Georgia reported on the "Farm to School" lunch program in the Athens-Clarke County schools.

Courtesy of Grady Newswatch and Grady Newsource, Henry W. Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Georgia