The "The Photos That Changed Us Forever" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Grabbed a few magazines and started leafing through them.  Then I came to the large format magazine with the cloth binding that I bought in October of 1996.  Still enjoy reading and looking at all the photos in that 60th Anniversary Life Magazine.  Some really powerful photos!  Starting on page 49 of the magazine, Life Magazine shows and describes the "60 Pictures That Change Us Forever."  As I started to look at the photos and read the commentary, I realized that some of the pages had the corner folded.  Not the first time that I had gone through the story and every time I seem to gravitate toward the same photos.  Still photography, whether it be black and white or color, has the power to envelope you in it's imagery.  Study a photograph.  See what you can learn that you never imagined knowing as you view the photograph.  You may feel emotions that you never had experienced before or realize that we have all changed because of the photograph.  The following are a few of MY favorites from the past.  Do you remember seeing them when they were first published?

Photograph taken by AP photographer Eddie Adams.  Adams captured this shot of a South Vietnamese general, Nguyen Ngoc Loan, executing a Viet Cong officer in the Tet Offensive. One of the most iconic shots of the Vietnam War. Adams would come to lament the damage the Pulitzer winning photo did to Nguyen and his family.

Photograph by Huynh Cong Ut taken in 1973 showing a naked girl running whit a group of other children after the napalm bombing of a Vietnamese village.  This was one of the photos that brought the atrocity of the war into Americans homes. 

Scottish photographer Iain Macmillan captured this photo in 1969.  It was the cover photograph for the final album recorded by The Beatles before their breakup.  Titled Abbey Road, it featured a shot of the four men crossing the road almost in lock-step, except for Paul McCartney, whose off-balance stride spurred the urban legend that he was dead.

Steve McCurry captured this photograph in 1984 of an Afghan Girl, known only as the Afghan girl, since her identity was unknown until she was rediscovered in 2002.  Sharbat Gula's face became one of the most iconic national Geographic covers of all time, and a symbol of the struggle of  refugees everywhere.  I have her photo on one of my Pinterest boards.  It feels as if she is staring right through me.  

Seems like only yesterday that this Kent State, Ohio protest was photographed by John Paul Filo.  The year was 1970 and the students were protesting President Nixon sending troops into Cambodia when the Ohio National Guard opened fire on the crowd, killing four.  The image of this young girl crying over the dead body of a student won a Pulitzer Prize and inspired Neil Young to write the protest song "Ohio."

This series of photographs was taken by Eadwaerd Muybridge in the 1800s.  It showed there really was a moment midstride when horses had all hooves off the ground.  It set off the revolution in motion photography that would become movies.  Some of my favorites.

This is perhaps my favorite photograph of all time.  It was taken in May of 1946 by W. Eugene Smith and titled "The Walk to Paradise Garden."  Smith had been wounded in the hand documenting WWII and had despaired about ever returning to photography until the day when he took this photo of his children walking behind their home in NY.

You must remember this iconic photograph titled "Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima."  It was taken by Joe Rosenthal in 1945.  It is one of the most indelible images of WWII and won a Pulitizer.  The photo is of U.S. Marines raising their flag atop Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima.  The image was used to create the USMC War Memorial near Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, D.C.  I am in the midst of writing a story that will detail the taking of this photo.  It will be published soon.