School Boycott Produces Vacant Desk: there was only scattered attendance today in this room in Cummins Elementary School in Cincinnati. Civil Rights groups called a one-day boycott to protest alleged de facto segregation in Cincinnati public schools. The teacher, whose name was not disclosed, said about half her class was absent. The school is in a neighborhood with a heavy black population.

On recto: typewritten title and date.
On verso: Associated Press stamp and date stamp.

Wire photographs were originally transmitted over phonelines, then later, by satellite. They were first used in the early 1920s. Associated Press became a leader with this. After pigment touch-ups, etc., the print is put into a drum (like a drum scanner). The image gets converted into audio tones that are transmitted. The tones are received and beamed onto photo-sensitive paper. Wire photographs are copies without originals---they are hybrid, transmitted objects. (Britt Salvesen, Curator and Department Head, Photography Department, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, March 30-31, 2022)

This object has the following keywords:

• Cincinnati
• Civil Rights Movements
• Classrooms
• Education
• Injustice
• Racial Discrimination
• School boycotts
• Segregation

• Image Dimensions: 6 1/2 x 9 3/16 in. (16.51 x 23.34 cm) Measured by Hudson, Karen
• Sheet Dimensions: 8 1/16 x 9 15/16 in. (20.48 x 25.24 cm) Measured by Hudson, Karen