Sentiment and science: Francis Greenwood Peabody and social reform photography in Harvard's Social Museum

This dissertation contributes to a redefinition of social reform photography through an analysis of photographs in Harvard University's Social Museum. Established in 1903 by Professor Francis Greenwood Peabody, the collection, organized into twenty-two social reform categories, contained over 6,600 photographs and additional illustrative materials documenting institutions and methods devised to alleviate social problems in Europe and America. Positioning reform as a modern agenda, Peabody believed that the key to the social question was the relationship between ethics and economics---what he expressed as sentiment and science. The Social Museum was not intended to be simply a collection of facts, but an archive of ideological and moral persuasion.;Chapter 1 analyzes the archival structure of the collection---its sources, physical arrangement, and system of classification---and the role it played in university education at Harvard. The second chapter considers Peabody's biography, his role in the history of social reform, and his teaching of social ethics at Harvard long after sociology departments were established at other universities. The third chapter presents models and sources for the Social Museum, including social economy exhibitions at international expositions, especially the 1889 and 1900 Expositions Universelles in Paris and the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis, and competing institutions, such as Paris's Musee Social and the American Institute for Social Service in New York. Chapter 4 sets up an analysis of the photographs in the Social Museum by using Jacob Riis's images as an example of the use of sentimental strategies and Lawrence Veiller's Tenement House Exhibition of 1900 as illustrating the application of science to reform photography. The final chapter comprises an analysis of the Social Museum photographs using the category of social settlements as a case study and microcosm of the entire collection.;Through a comparative study of reform projects and collections that incorporated photography, this dissertation demonstrates how Peabody's Social Museum is a model for a much broader study of social reform photography. While the museum presented photographs as scientific evidence of successful reform efforts, it was their emotional appeal that engaged viewers, ensuring their effectiveness over other forms of data.