West Virginia has been through some difficult times, and not the least of those times were the Great Depression. Luckily for us, things have improved greatly since then. If you’ve ever wondered what life was like in West Virginia during that time, these rare pictures will give you a clue.

1. These children of a family that lived in a riverboat in Charleston in 1938.
Marion Post Wolcott/ Library of Congress LC-USF33-030071
2. This scene showing coal miners arriving on payday in Omar in 1938.
Marion Post Wolcott/Library of Congress
3. This wife of an unemployed miner worker and two kids. The woman had tuberculosis and syphilis. The family was one of five families living in an abandoned company store in Marine.
Marion Post Wolcott/Library of Congress LC-USF34-050109
4. These children of homesteaders in Tygart Valley getting potatoes out of the garden in 1938.
Marion Post Wolcott/Library of Congress LC-USF33-030120
5. This shot of the town of Williamson in 1935.
Ben Shahn/Library of Congress LC-USF33-006195
6. These coal company houses in Omar in 1935.
Ben Shahn/Library of Congress
7. The funeral procession of a 5-year-old boy in Red House in 1935.
Elmer Johnson/Library of Congress LC-USF33-008023

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8. This four-room house in Eleanor that housed workers from the Plymouth mines.
unknown/Library of Congress LC-USF34-092018
9. This man who lived in a shack by the river in Charleston in 1938
Marion Post Wolcott/Library of Congress LC-USF33-030074
10. These housewives in Tygart Valley having a quilting meeting in September 1938.
Marion Post Wolcott/Library of Congress
11. This coal miner’s wife with her baby on a porch in Mohegan in September 1938.
Marion Post Wolcott/Library of Congress LC-USF33-030062
12. This group of coal miners in Williamson in 1935.
Ben Shahn/Library of Congress LC-USF33-006195
13. This child with its mother, who had tuberculosis, in Charleston in 1938.
Marion Post Wolcott/Library of Congress LC-USF33-030104
14. This shot that shows Freeze Fork in Logan County in the year 1935.
Ben Shahn/Library of Congress
15. These men sitting on a curb in Omar in October 1935.
Ben Shahn/Library of Congress

What did you think of these photos? Did you happen to recognize any of the scenes?

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