Beautiful breastfeeding photos from our collective past. Tell us which one is your favorite.
Inuit Woman Breast-feeding Baby, c1908, Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-104388
"The Cornstock Madonna," c1916, Illinois, Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-137707
"A free lunch," c1890, New York, Library of Congress, LC-USZ62-103644
About
Melanie Mayo-Laakso is the Web Editor for Mothering.com. Mothering is the birthplace of natural family living and attachment parenting. We celebrate the experience of parenthood as worthy of one's best efforts and are at once fierce advocates for children and gentle supporters of parents.
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Beautiful!
I love the Cornstalk Madonna. It’s really a lovely photo. I would hang a print of it up in my house.
I love them all. What a beautiful glimpse into the past. I would love to see more of these kinds of pictures.
I love them all, but my favorite is also the Cornstalk Madonna.
I love them all but the third makes me want to know more about what’s going on in the picture.
I love them all, but there’s something about Inuit Woman Breast-Feeding Baby. My husband says it’s because that baby reminds me of our son. Looking at it from that perspective, I noticed that that “baby” is definitely the oldest of the bunch. Maybe he’s right as I’m still nursing my 3 year old and identify the most with that woman at the moment.
Definitely the “Cornstalk Madonna”- absolutely beautiful. They are all amazing photos!
I love the first photo. A toddler nursing! Just beautiful.
My thoughts exactly.
o my you mean we didnt always give babies fake milk. lol. <3 it
Cornstalk Madonna. Post more! These are all great. I’m a nursing mom without a community. Need more pix!
I don’t know you, but I want to tell you that I think your amazing and brave for nursing your child without a ton of support. You are the best mother for doing what you are! Just wanted you to know that you are appreciated!
Oh these are all so gorgeous! I second Sarah in that these would make beautiful prints to hang upon the wall.
I absolutely love the Cornstalk one… It is captivating to look at and share a little part of their sweet relationship.
Oh how I love these, the babies are so right looking.
I like the Free Lunch picture. The mom looks pretty content and relaxed. Just like I felt when I sat down and fed my children.
Love them all! …. I alsomlove that they are in natural environments.
Cornstalk Madonna
I love how robust & healthy these babies are!
Yes, beautiful. How strange a society we are that we have paraded porn and shut away such wholesomeness, goodness, and life.
It would be great to have a book published with these images! I’d have it out as my “coffee table” book!
Cornstalk Madonna….probably because my current (3rd) nursling is about the age of the baby in this photo. They are all beautiful! Please post more photos
All are beautiful photographs. There is something especially nurturing about Cornstalk Madonna.
The Cornstock Madonna reminds me of my ten month nursling. I too would hang this in my home and would love to see more pictures like this.
Beautiful pictures! So nice to see proof of natural bonding and love in our history.
I also love that the inuit “baby” is older!
Love all of the photos… I think a lot more ppl should look at nursing as being natural instead of turning their noses up at it. I’m a proud nursing mom & I’m not ashamed to nurse my baby anywhere!
I love that the picture are so diverse <3
I love all of hear pictures, they are loving and personal, but I wonder if it is these images of working women, brown (by birth or sun, that inspired the white middle and upper class Americans of the 20′s and 30′s and beyond to consider themselves to pristine or privileged to nurse their own, giving over first to wet-nurses and ultimately to men, or should I say man-made milk instead of thief own? Hurling us into the next century trying to reclaim respect for the the simple and profound act of nurturing our young close at heart with our own human milk.
I love them all, I can’t choose just one. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder and I find all nursing and all maternity photos so beautiful.
love them all! lets see more like this! great post. seeing iconic images like this is so inspiring and reconnects me to the strength i find in remembering that even in “mundane daily tasks” i am embodying the spirit
& function of the archetypal mother…especially in breastfeeding!
The cornstalk madonna is my favorite.Beautiful chubby, peacefully sleeping baby eventhough its obvious the world around is probably difficult and hard. I wish I had a copy to hang on my wall. They are all so beautiful and speak much! Would love to see more. thanks!
I am a nursing mother (my daughter just turned 2) and a photographer. Last year I did a series of portraits of nursing mothers here in Los Angeles. I am currently working on funding to continue this project. If you would like to see the images they are available on Blurb.com. My book is called “Mother’s Milk.” http://www.blurb.com/my/book/detail/1714468
Thank you!
I love them all, each is a reminder of those everyday yet special moments nursing our babies (or toddlers, for that matter!). I like that the “Inuit woman” picture shows a toddler nursing, perhaps because I can relate to it. My fifteen-month-old is still nursing, and I plan to continue as long as he would like to. For me, nursing is an important part of mothering my son and it definitely makes me feel connected to a sort of “universal spirit”, to all mothers past and present.
Breastfeeding is the second most natural thing a woman can do next to giving birth to a child! These images are amazing and make me wonder what the context of the pictures are…what was happening and where they lived…especially the third photo? I nursed my son till he was two and half and now as a three year old he tells me he misses “milk” I miss the nursing days when he would sit there and giggle and fall asleep…..I wouldn’t let a bottle between us!!
This is perfectly normal and It makes me wonder who would complain that a baby is getting fed absolute ludicrous indeed. The only time I got embarrased was when someone was breastfeeding a baby and I said can i be next (**Meaning I wanted to hold the baby**) I have never been so Red Faced lol. I am sure they knew what I meant though.
Its nutrient content is amazing and its what the baby needs. I was a COW & GATE baby but if I was fed naturally maybe I would not have so many health issues now.
Good Luck Ladies !!!!!!!
These would be a wonderful addition in local WIC offices, where they hang lots of pictures of breastfeeding pairs. Connecting with women in our past is one of the things that bolsters modern mothers in their breastfeeding endeavors.
Beautiful! I agree with coffee table book suggestion! They are all so touching.
I adore these pictures, and my favorite is the third. How beautiful are the days when you didn’t have to hide feeding your child?
You can tell life wasn’t easy for those women,all of them very thin and look like they were hard workers,but a mothers love is so incredible to provide the nourishment those babies needed.Beautiful pictures!
Beautiful Photos! The Cornstock Madonna is my favorite! I love how healthy and chunky her baby is!
Amazing…and beautiful images. Motherhood captured on film!
They are all so beautiful! I guess my favorite would be “Cornstock Madonna”. It is just such a lovely picture.
I don’t understand what everyone is talking about… bringing back nursing.. not hiding nursing… I am 52 years old.. well I will be tomorrow anyway…. I was breastfed.. my younger siblings were breast fed and I can remember my mother squirting me with her milk when I got too close! I breastfed my babies… I never felt I had to hide. No one ever said anything to me about it. Actually just the opposite… seems every time I was in public nursing, some La Leche League fanatic would come up and praise me… I hated it. Maybe if they hadn’t made such a big deal out of it, and made women feel like failures for not doing it more would be inclined to do it.
@Margie: I am 36 years old and I was bottle fed, my Mother is turning 60 and she and all her siblings were bottle fed. In the 1950′s and 1960′s and there was a BIG push to formula feed your babies. Only poor women who couldn’t afford the expensive formula breastfed their babies. My family came from a middle class family in Southern California. Now that I am nursing my baby, everyone in my family is almost horrified that I’m still nursing my 2 year old like some hippie! I might as well be living in a commune and wearing dreadlocks…
Im still nursing my 2.5 year old and I get A LOT of crap from both sides of my families for it. I song care what they think, but it still hurts a little. I come from a bottle fed baby family. I can’t even think of anyone who has breastfed any of their children. Except my cousin that is now nursing her baby, but she’s my age with a younger son…
Again an insightful post. Thanks.
I love the first one! It is such a typical nursing toddler! I love the many poses and positions they will get into to nurse! What beautiful pictures!
Oh I love these, all of them–the look on the mother’s face in the last one is fabulous, too.
All of the photographs are beautiful. I love the peaceful look on the mothers face in “A Free Lunch” too cool!
The cornstalk madonna, only because the child reminds me of my son how he is sitting. they are all beautiful! thank you for publishing these. I’d love to see more.
Thank you for sharing these beautiful photos. I think my favorite was the Inuit Woman because of the composition.
I love the cornstock Madonna! That is my favorite! They are all beautiful though!
I meant cornstalk lol…but yes, I too would love to see more photos!
I am and always been a supporter of breastfeeding. There are so many positives to list them here would be a waste of time because it would be like preaching to the choir. However, I have never understood why breastfeeding can not be done modestly, meaning not showing your breast. I am not saying to slink back in the dark corner somewhere but to have a covering. But so many seem to think that having the ability to breast feed is equal to having an absolute right to flash a breast. Why cant there be the best of both worlds out there? I do not think that there would be so many debates about breastfeeding in public if people where modest. I believe the bible has a verse which paraphrased says just because something is acceptable or right doesnt mean that is is right in all situations.
The cornstalk one is my favorite, but they are all wonderful. Would love to see more.
All of my peers around here weaned early, but my son (who was weaned at 2 1/2 or so) still asks for “just a sip” every once in a while. Yesterday (he just turned 3) he asked, and I let him, but asked him why he wanted to, since I didn’t have any more milk. He said I just needed to drink some milk and water and it would go into my bobos (our code word) and then he could drink some more. He’s going to be delighted when this little one I’m carrying comes and my breasts are full once again. I wonder if he is going to be fully weaned ever, but truthfully, I miss it.
Can we find prints of these somewhere?
I would love a print of one of these if you here of where to get one.
I can’t decide between Inuit Woman or Cornstalk Madonna. Cornstalk Momma is a beautiful picture,, but Inut Woman reminds me of all three of my kiddos.