10 Photos that made history.

• Author: Majerol, Veronica
• Position: TIME PAST

WITH CAMERA-EQUIPPED SMARTPHONES everywhere today, it may be hard to imagine a world before photographs. But photography is actually pretty young, going back to about 1826. That's when Joseph Nicephore Niepce snapped what's believed to be the first-ever permanent photograph from his window in the Burgundy region of France.

Since then, cameras have captured images of war, peace, injustice, joy, and everything in between. Here, we offer a selection of photos that have captivated America-and, sometimes, changed how we think about the world.

[1963] Civil Rights In 1963, Birmingham, Alabama, was considered one of the most segregated places in the United States. That year, civil rights protesters staged a nonviolent anti-segregation campaign. It included sit-ins, boycotts, and marches, led mostly by children. The city's commissioner of public safety, Bull Connor, reacted with violence, ordering police to attack protesters with dogs and high-power water hoses (above). The graphic images, like this photo, shocked America and helped get public opinion behind the Civil Rights Act, which President Lyndon B. Johnson signed into law the following year (see Upfront, March 31, 2014).

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[1862] Lincoln at Antietam

The Civil War (1861-65) was the first major war to be extensively photographed. Working under Mathew Brady--the most famous Civil War photographer--Alexander Gardner captured a series of posed images of President Abraham Lincoln shortly after the Battle of Antietam on Sept. 17, 1862 (here with intelligence officer Allan Pinkerton, left, and Major General John A. McClernand, right). Antietam was the single bloodiest day of the war, with nearly 23,000 men killed or wounded. After Confederate troops retreated, Lincoln traveled to the Maryland battlefield, trying--unsuccessfully--to persuade General George B. McLellan to finish off the Confederate army before it recovered. With momentum on his side, the president issued the Emancipation Proclamation on Jan. 1, 1863, declaring all slaves in Confederate states to be "forever free."

ONLINE: MORE CIVIL WAR PHOTOS

[1911] Child Labor

In 1908, photographer Lewis Hine began traveling the U.S. to document scenes of child labor. At the time, nearly 2 million children in the U.S. under 16 worked in coal mines, glass and garment factories, and canneries, often for 10 to 12 hours a day. No federal laws against child labor existed, and the few states with laws rarely enforced them. Hine's work--like this 1911 photo showing two young...