Hobo Day at Athens High School

 

In case the caption is too fuzzy to read, I'll repeat it: "This intriguing photograph was taken on April 22, 1927, a day for letting one's hair down and forgetting the rules. Dressed in some truly outlandish costumes, students at Athens High School on West State Street celebrate Hobo Day, a tradition that has gone by the wayside. Straw, 2007.

NOTE: This post should not count as a post in its own right; it is mostly a comment to Noelle. The only reason I have made it a post is that I could not discern how to add a photograph to a comment.

I think that it is interesting that dressing as a hobo used to be common practice in a less politically correct time period. I think this photograph reflects the nature of humans in a way that may explain (if not excuse) a person dressing up as a homeless person for Halloween. 

    It is important to understand that many of these kids would have grown up in comparatively hard times. True, this predates the depression, but that does not negate the fact that it is the 1920s. Basic utilities such as running water, electricity and gas were still rare or brand new in 1927; "In 1937, only ten percent of Ohioans living in rural south-central Ohio had electricity in their homes," (Ohio History Connection). Certainly most of these kids would have lived in conditions far worse than most kids in modern Athens, some of even the middle class being worse off than the modern poor. Lacking a gas stove, central heating, an in-house water closet and a family car, the poorer kids, though still elevated from the rank of hobo, were far less removed than those kids of today. Many of their parents and grandparents had grown up in an even less advanced time, in a time when most families were lucky to have one room all to themselves, in a time before grocery stores, in a time when people were generally sick all through the winter due to malnutrition (Allitt 2014). Also, the "homelessness epidemic" of the 1980s had yet to occur, so it would have been far easier for them to see hobos, most of them young men, as a romanticized quirk of their society rather than their status as an endemic problem, perhaps the same way we view the bohemian characters of "Rent".

    All of that said, there exists in the 21st century a HUGE gap between hobos/homeless and the rest of society. More than that, any educated person these days has little excuse for not recognizing that homelessness is an endemic problem affecting families in rather harmful ways. I think it is in rather poor taste for privileged people to dress as a mockery of the families, the veterans and the otherwise dispossessed that make up the homeless, but I believe that this photo and its historical context may elucidate why people may do so without any malevolent intentions. Understanding this gap in knowledge may be useful in closing said gap and ending the practice in the future.

Afterword: I generally have a mixed opinion of the "It's a Culture, Not a Costume" movement; I understand it's in poor taste to dress up "as a Mexican" or "as a Japanese", but some of their examples are a bit too sensitive in my opinion. There should be nothing controversial about a white woman--or man, for that matter--dressing up as a geisha girl, just like there should be nothing controversial about an Asian dressing up as a cowboy, nor a black man dressing up as a Nazi soldier, nor a girl dressing up as superman. A white girl dressing up "as a Chinese", "as a Pacific Islander" or "as an American-Indian"? Yes, that's racist and should be discouraged. But a white girl dressing up as "Mulan", "Moana" or "Pocahontas"? I fail to see the harm in that; by that logic, any non-white girl should be forbidden from dressing up as Anna, Elsa or Ariel, much less real-life celebrities such as Susan B. Anthony and Eleanor Roosevelt; any non-white boy should be forbidden from dressing as Superman or Spiderman, much less The Great Emancipator Abraham Lincoln. Perhaps I've gone on too long about this, but I've had a chip on my shoulder about this since 2013, when this movement first came to be. 

Sources:

Allitt, Patrick. 2014. The Industrial Revolution. The Great Courses. Chantilly, Virginia.

    This is a lecture series detailing the evolution of poverty and privilege in Europe, America and eventually the rest of the world, from the 18th century to the present day. Contact me at nr303414@ohio.edu or 740-591-9511 if you want to know the specific lectures to which I'm referring. 

Ohio History Connection. https://ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Electricity#:~:text=It%20was%20not%20until%20President,had%20electricity%20in%20their%20homes.

    This was my source for the electrification question. Of course, city dwellers would have been more privileged than rural folk.

Shaw, Richard A., with assistance from the Athens County Historical Society and Museum. 2007. Images of America: Athens. p. 55, photograph 2. Arcadia Publishing. Charleston, South Carolina.

    This is the book from which I scanned the photo of "Hobo Day".

Further resources:

Kay, Terry. 1976. The Year the Lights Came On. Center Point Publishing. Thorndike, Maine.

    This book is partially novel, partially memoir, set in rural Georgia when the Southern countryside was finally electrified.