22 Photos Blanketed in Smog During the Industrial Revolution

These 22 smog-tinted photos offer a gritty glimpse into the Industrial Revolution, capturing the smoke-filled skies and soot-covered streets of an era that transformed the world with both progress and pollution.

Smog coats a town during the industrial revolution, date unknown.

Smokestacks spewing smoke in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, circa 1890.

A “Sun and Planet” steam engine, circa the late 18th century

Mine workers push carts out of a shaft in Virginia City, Nevada, circa 1867.

Kids working in a Georgia factory, date unknown.

Men working at an undergarment factory in Hudson, New York. 1917.

A child at work at what appears to be a textile mill, date unknown.

Workers living in a tenement, 1889

Factory workers locking in, 1911.

Workers stand for a photograph at Dominion Corset, 1898.

The interior of a women’s lodging room, 1888.

Workers attempting to mine for tin, 1893.

A photograph of a fuse factory, circa the late 1800s.

The exterior of Otis Steelworks, 1895.

Workers toil away at a button factory, 1899.

“Industrial revolution, 1908-1912. Spinner in Whitnel Cotton Mill, NC. Worked in the mill one year, sometimes at night, 48 cents a day. When asked how old she was, she hesitated, then said, ‘I don’t remember,’ then added confidentially, ‘I’m not old enough.’”

“The Weavers Triangle, Burnley Lancashire, 1910. The town’s cotton mills at their peak of their prosperity with 99,000 power looms in operation.”

“Before alarm clocks became widely affordable in the 1940s and 1950s, there were people – called ‘knocker-uppers’ – who had the job of waking up workers during the Industrial Revolution, often by shooting dry peas from a pea shooter at their windows.”

Workers at a woolcombing factory, 1899

The inside of a factory, 1891.

“Newsboys during the Industrial Revolution, early 1900s.”

“Medical lab during the Industrial Revolution, 1810s.”