Lost Schools: A Photo that Launched a Revolution
May 10, 2015
Hazleton, Iowa – The iconic photo of Amish children fleeing into Iowa cornfields to escape school and law enforcement officers who were there to enforce compulsory public education laws turns 50 this fall.
Taken by Des Moines Register photographer Thomas DeFeo, the image was picked up in Life magazine and other publications, and historians credit it with rallying a national public outcry. It resulted in a religious liberties movement that substantially shifted Iowa's public education requirements, granting wide exemptions that remain in place today. The Register in the past month returned to the site as part of its yearlong "Lost Schools" project and spoke with some of the key players in the 1965 incident.
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