Child workers at a Delaware cannery in 1910. Photo: Library of Congress
CGS member Barbara Kridl spotted this article about the introduction of birth certificates in America. Anyone who’s searched in vain for their ancestor’s birth record knows the frustration of not having documentation of that simple fact. Unlike Europe, the United States did not at first consider the recording of births an official government matter. That began to change around the turn of the twentieth century, largely because of activism by Progressive Era reformers who sought to stop the exploitation of children by establishing child labor laws. Having documentation to prove a child’s age was an important part of that.
The Birth Certificate: An American History, is a book by Susan J. Pearson that traces the document’s two-hundred-year history to explain when, how, and why birth certificates came to matter so much in the United States, eventually helping to define what it is to be an American.
The JSTOR article includes more information, with links to related articles and to Pearson’s book. Click HERE to read more.
JAN
2022