Photos reveal, recognize black work camps during Depression

DETROIT (AP) — A striking, sepia-toned picture recently acquired by the University of Michigan jumps out from the past and begs to tell a story: A man dressed in a heavy coat and hat is as big as the cabin door whose knob he is reaching to turn and enter.

The picture is labeled simply, "Big Jim."

The rare photo is among 30 acquired by the Bentley Historical Library last year from a private donor that capture a place and time often overlooked by history: black Civilian Conservation Corps camps in Michigan and elsewhere during the Great Depression. The photos are the only known images of the state's segregated, all-black camps.