Diorama: "Irrigation of a Cotton Field"

Created for the inaugural installations at the U.S. Department of the Interior Museum, which opened in 1938, this original diorama depicts the irrigation of a cotton field. Two men--one standing and one kneeling turning a valve--are in a crop of cotton observing an irrigation canal. At left is the side of a red barn and some white fencing. The painted backdrop shows more fields and a house with chickens or geese grazing outside. There is also a third person near a harvesting machine.