October 1940. "Mr. Leatherman, homesteader, coming out of his dugout home at Pie Town, New Mexico." View full size. 4x5 Kodachrome transparency by Russell Lee. Another example of the dugout-style structure used for the homesteader dwellings and church in the Dead Ox Flat photos. Before industry and technology gave us sawmills and frame houses, this is how the average person lived in much of the world. The dugout or pit house, with sod roof, log walls and earthen floor, is among the most ancient of human dwellings -- at some point in history your ancestors lived in one. Especially popular among 19th-century settlers in the Great Plains and deserts of the West and Southwest, where trees and other building materials were scarce, dugouts were warmer in winter and cooler in summer than above-ground structures; just about anywhere in North America the ground temperature three feet down is 55 degrees regardless of the season. [Addendum: This picture was taken using Kodachrome sheet film (5 inches by 4 inches) and (probably) a Graflex Speed Graphic press camera. The image you see here was scanned from the positive transparency itself, not a print.]

September 1940. Garden and dugout home of Jack Whinery, homesteader at Pie Town, New Mexico. View full size. 4x5 Kodachrome transparency: Russell Lee.

October 1939. "All the members of the congregation. Friends church (Quaker)." Mrs. Wardlow and Mrs. Hull are over to the left of the entrance to the dugout. Dead Ox Flat, Malheur County, Oregon. View full size. Photo: Dorothea Lange.

April 1936. "Junk, with living quarters close by." Milwaukee, Wisconsin. 3¼ x 4¼ nitrate negative photographed by Carl Mydans. View full size.

October 1939. Mrs. Wardlow [Wardlaw] at the Society of Friends church. Dead Ox Flat, Malheur County, Oregon. View full size. Photograph by Dorothea Lange.

April 1936. View from living quarters at 730 West Winnebago Street, looking back down the alley. Milwaukee, Wisconsin. View full size. Photo by Carl Mydans.

November 1935. Alley near L Street NW with Blake School in background. Washington, D.C. View full size. Photograph by Carl Mydans.