Unloading Bananas, Mobile, Alabama, circa 1906

01

Artifact Overview

Bananas arrived on grocery store shelves via a transportation system controlled by competing fruit companies and their government allies. Refrigerated railcars moved the crop from Central American plantations to ships bound for U.S. ports in the Gulf of Mexico. This photograph shows dockworkers in Mobile, Alabama, unloading bunches of bananas -- each weighing around 86 pounds -- from a ship's hold and moving them to a warehouse.

Artifact Details

Artifact

Photographic print

Subject Date

circa 1906

Location

By Request in the Benson Ford Research Center

Object ID

37.102.P.030981

Credit

From the Collections of The Henry Ford.

Material

Paper (Fiber product)

Technique

Gelatin silver process

Color

Sepia (Color)

Dimensions

Height: 4.875 in
Width: 7.5 in