In 1943, my father, Jack Delano, photographed the life of railroad workers in the U.S. for the government's Office of War Information (OWI), an outgrowth of the Farm Security Administration's renowned documentary photography program. The coverage was centered in Chicago.

Many decades later, the Center for Railroad Photography and Art, in Madison, WI, carried out extensive historical and genealogical research in order to locate the descendants of the workers that my father had photographed in 1943. They were able to locate the descendants of about 45 people pictured in the original images.

Center founder John Gruber then acted as my guide in Chicago, as we visited and made portraits of the descendant families. Working with the Center, the Chicago History Museum mounted a major exhibition of the Jack Delano photos which will remain on view until 2016. The exhibition includes a video interview in which I discuss what it was like to "reconnect" with these descendants, otherwise perfect strangers.

The Jack Delano photographs, as well as my photos of the descendants, are published in the exhibition catalog Railroaders: Jack Delano's Homefront Photography.

Please click on SHOW CAPTIONS at the bottom of the main menu on the left for information about the images.