In 1908, the National Child Labor Committee hired photographer Lewis Hine to document the lives of working children across the United States. He traveled to factories, mines, and city streets, speaking directly with child workers and capturing their conditions on camera. By 1911, his work brought him to Eastport, Maine — a small coastal community made up of a cluster of islands — where children as young as five years old were employed in the sardine canning industry.
Eastport’s sardine factories depended heavily on child labor as a cheap and available workforce. Most of these children worked as “cutters,” slicing the heads and tails off freshly caught fish before passing them along to be packed into cans. A skilled cutter could earn around $1.50 for a full day’s work, though some children reported earning up to $2.00 on busy days. The hours were not fixed — workers stayed until every fish had been processed, regardless of how late that ran.
The physical environment inside the cutting sheds was dangerous. Workers stood on slippery floors covered in fish refuse and saltwater. The knives used were large butcher-style blades, and children were expected to work fast. Speed was rewarded — cutters were paid by the box, earning five cents per box — which pushed them to rush through the work regardless of the risk. Hine noted that workers frequently bumped into one another, and the combination of wet floors, sharp blades, and cramped quarters made cuts almost unavoidable. Even adult workers admitted they could not help injuring themselves.
Nine-year-old Minnie Thomas worked regularly at Seacoast Canning Co.’s Factory #7, mostly in the packing room, and put in night shifts when the factory was at full capacity. Her mother told Hine plainly: “Some of the children cut their fingers half off.” Minnie’s father and grandfather also worked in the same factory.
Cuts were not minor inconveniences — they were a daily reality. Salt from the fish worked its way into every open wound. Nine-year-old George Goodell had his finger badly cut and wrapped in cloth while still on the floor of Factory #7. When Hine spoke with him, George said simply, “The salt gets into the cut.” His six-year-old brother Clarence worked alongside him, helping where he could. Seven-year-old Grayson Forsythe worked at the same station.
Eight-year-old Richard Mills and seven-year-old Byron were among the many children Hine photographed with visibly injured hands. Byron told him directly: “I cut my finger nearly off, cutting sardines the other day.” Hine photographed both the children and their wounds individually, ensuring the injuries were on record.
One of the most striking cases Hine documented involved eight-year-old Phoebe Thomas, a Syrian girl who had sliced the end of her thumb nearly off while cutting sardines. She was sent home from the factory alone, running and crying, her hand and arm covered in blood. Her mother was still at work and could not leave. A week later, Hine photographed Phoebe’s thumb as it healed — and noted that she had already returned to the factory, using the same large knife.
Children who were not cutting fish worked as “cartoners,” folding and assembling the cardboard packaging for the canned sardines. This role was filled by some of the youngest workers documented by Hine. Six-year-old Elsie Shaw worked as a cartoner at Seacoast Canning Co.’s Factory #2 every summer. Her father, who ran the cutting room at Factory #1, asked Hine to take her photograph — not out of concern, but because he used her image in a vaudeville act she performed in the winter, where she would walk through the audience selling her own photos.
Five-year-old Preston, identified only by his first name, worked different sessions throughout the day — starting at 7 a.m., returning in the afternoon, and showing up again at 6 p.m. Hine recorded that he “kept at it very faithfully for so young a worker.” Nine-year-old Nan de Gallant worked alongside her mother and sisters. One of Nan’s sisters had earned $7 in a single day during the rush season, when women and children began at 7 a.m. and sometimes worked until midnight.
Between rushes, children waited in groups for the next batch of fish to arrive. None of the canning process was automated, meaning every can passed through multiple sets of hands before it was shipped to market. Because fish deliveries were unpredictable, workers — children included — spent significant stretches of time idle on the factory floor, only to be called back into intense, fast-paced work when the next haul arrived.
Ten-year-old Wilfred Clark finished a morning shift having cut five boxes of fish. As he walked home at noon, Hine noted a fresh cut on his left forefinger. The two boys walking with him both had fingers that showed signs of previous cuts, already scarred over and healed. Eleven-year-old Fulsom McCutcheon had worked the covering machines at an Eastport canning factory as well as doing cutting work.
The Goodell family’s living situation showed how deeply the canneries shaped daily life in Eastport. The family lived year-round in temporary housing on the grounds of Seacoast Cannery #7. The father worked at a nearby mill while four or five of the children worked in the canneries. These were not seasonal arrangements made out of convenience — this was the permanent structure of the family’s existence.
Hine’s photographs from the Eastport canneries showed children with blank expressions and bandaged hands, holding knives nearly as long as their forearms. He recorded their names, ages, wages, working hours, and injuries with precision. The images were not posed to dramatize suffering — the reality on the factory floor was already stark enough.
