Feeling blue: how denim built America – in pictures

Originally used as workwear for back-breaking jobs, these vintage images show the fabric’s role in dragging the US out of the Great Depression

Defence plant worker, Michigan, July 1944

These photographs, many previously unseen, capture ordinary Americans of every race, young and old, relentlessly toiling – hands, face, boots and denim dirty – to push the US out of the Great Depression into the prosperity of its postwar years. All are wearing the toughest utility fabric available to them: denim. Here we see a defence plant worker making adjustments to the warhead section of a US navy torpedo at a factory of the Pontiac motor division of General Motors. Denim: The Fabric That Built America 1935-1944 is published by Reel Art Press. All photographs: Courtesy of Reel Art Press

Walter Latta, Bozeman, Montana, July 1939

Rancher Walter Latta, who guides fishing and hunting parties, in classic western turnout, his jacket based on the design of a Levi’s 506 denim jacket. The only difference between denim clothing now and 80-odd years ago is that, back then, denim was the fabric used for serious workwear. It was a time when men and women in America worked as miners, felled trees, rode the rails and raised cattle; they planted crops, worked in construction and in factories. The common thread that bound them together was denim clothing

JD Estes, naval air base, Corpus Christi, Texas, August 1942

In the 18th century, a coarse fabric manufactured in Genoa, Italy, and worn by labourers was referred to as bleu de Gênes, which gave us “jeans”. At the same time, a tough twill fabric made in the south of France called serge de Nîmes gave us “denim”. Back then, the fabric was made from a blend of wool and silk, unlike today’s denim, which is mostly made from cotton. Without doubt, the godfathers of denim workwear were Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis

Daytona Beach, Florida, January 1943

A welder in the National Youth Administration (NYA) at Bethune-Cookman College, wearing a denim jacket provided by NYA. Known as the colour of the working class, blue was the cheapest colour to produce. Even today, the term ‘blue-collar’ refers to someone who does manual labor

Douglas Aircraft Company, Long Beach, California, October 1942

Women at work on a bomber. The woman in the foreground pairs her denim with red socks and safety shoes with an inner metal plate in the toes for protection from falling weights

Creek County, Oklahoma, 1940

Tenant farmer Pomp Hall’s eldest son coming through the doorway of his house. He is wearing Round House hickory stripe overalls with a corduroy blouson jacket and a tweed plaid cap. It is said that over 80% of the planet have owned an item of denim clothing. We spend hours crafting the insouciant turn of a hem and the casual roll of a collar, and happily spend our hard-earned money on carefully weathered, faded denim

Heil Company, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, February 1943

Mrs Angeline Kwint, an ex-housewife aged 45, checking the tyres of trailers in Union Made overalls

Todd Erie Basin dry dock, Pennsylvania, 1943

Women welders on the way to work democratically wearing denim overalls and jackets issued by the welding company

Chicago and North Western Railroad roundhouse, Clinton, Iowa, April 1943

Lunchtime at the railroad company. Neatly tied colourful headscarves break up the prevailing denim

Bethlehem-Fairfield Shipyard, Baltimore, Maryland, May 1943

This photograph of a welder eating ice-cream with his cap back to front and wearing sunglasses and protective welding armbands could easily be a contemporary picture

Daniel Senise, Indiana Harbor Belt Railroad yard, Chillicothe, Illinois, 1943

Daniel Senise, in union-made Lee denim, throwing a switch. This wasn’t the designer denim look, but clothing for real hard work. When this clothing wore out, they patched it, sometimes patching a patch until they were wearing the patch itself

Missouri/Arkansas state line, October 1942

A pot firer and his assistants working on the War Emergency Pipeline. Their faces are painted with salve for protection against fumes of hot asphalt paint. • Denim: The Fabric That Built America 1935-1944 is written and art-directed by renowned author, art director, and denim historian Graham Marsh. The book’s images were edited by Tony Nourmand