Framed or unframed, desk size to sofa size, printed by us in Arizona and Alabama since 2007. Explore now.
Shorpy is funded by you. Patreon contributors get an ad-free experience.
Learn more.
August 27, 1935. "Congressional pages -- Mr. Sandman. Fred Johnson of Wyoming and Howard Ostmann of the District of Columbia, congressional pages, photographed as they snatched a bit of shuteye while the House and Senate brought the session to an ignominious adjournment." View full size.
Perhaps the lad on the left is Fred W. Johnson Jr., son of Fred W. Johnson of Wyoming, the Federal Land Commissioner during FDR's administration (and, in the Truman Administration, the first director of the Bureau of Land Management). The 1940 census reports that Fred Jr. - then eighteen years old - lived on New Hampshire Avenue with his parents and two older sisters.
Walt Kelly once said that politics is easy on the brain but hard on the feet.
Fred Johnson, out of the 146,000 people in his State, was chosen to be a Page by the one Wyoming congressman in the House Of Representatives and he falls asleep on the job.
According to death and veterans records, Howard Ostmann was born on November 25, 1921, served in WW2, and died on October 4, 1946. He is buried in Arlington National Cemetery.
That would put me to sleep too.
On Shorpy:
Today’s Top 5