Name/Title
StereographEntry/Object ID
2023.055.3.0280Description
A black and white stereograph. Image is of a group of men standing in a body of water, one man holds a fishing net. Above the image "T397 (Star)" is printed, below the image "19448T Russian Fishermen drawing their Nets on the Lower Volga River, Russia." is printed, to the left of the image "Keystone View Company COPYRIGHTED Manufacturers MADE IN U.S.A. Publishers" is printed, to the right of the image "Meadville, Pa., New York, N. Y., Chicago, Ill., London, England." is printed. On the reverse the following is printed:
19448
THE GRINDING TOIL OF THE VOLGA FISHERMEN, RUSSIA
Whether in the old days of the supremacy of the czars or at present under the equally dictatorial rule of the Communists, the existence of the average Russian peasant or laborer has been a hard one. Formerly he was exploited for the benefit of the classes; now he is exploited ostensibly for the ultimate uplifting of the masses. But in both cases he has been a pawn in the hands of higher powers, forced to labor like a slave in order to live at all. Seldom has he modern implements with which to work; his tools and his methods are pitifully primitive and his own physical efforts play the most important part in nearly every task he has to do.
These fishermen, drawing their nets from the waters of the broad lower Volga River, reflect in their faces and attitudes the narrowness and poverty of their lives. They remind us of the long suffering and tragedy which finds poignant musical expression in the "Song of the Volga Boatmen." The ignorance, the hopelessness bred of lack of inspiration and opportunity, the patient, animal-like endurance of heavy toil, which are their inheritance from countrless generation fo ancestors who have known no better lot, are all plainly written on their persons. Yet these men are representatives of a race possessing boundles capabilities. In most fields of thought the untrammeled intellect of the Slav is the equal of the intellect of any other race, and in many it is superior. Like the vast river of their native land at whose margin they are toiling, their tremendous potential power and usefulness for temselves and for all the world are wasted so long as they remain undeveloped and without aim.
Copyright by The Keystone View CompanyCollection
Photograph Collection