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Pulitzer Prize Winning Photos
[1942 - 2011]
The Pulitzer Prize was named after publisher Joseph Pulitzer (1847-1911), who established the New York World and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.
In his will, Pulitzer left a $2 million endowment to Columbia University to establish both a school of journalism and "prizes or scholarships for the encouragement of public service, public morals, American literature, and the advancement of education." Over the years, the specific award categories have been modified by the Board, which added a prize for photography in 1939 and was first awarded in 1942. The category was expanded to two awards in 1968, one for spot news and one for features.
An advisory board oversees the Pulitzer Prizes, with Columbia University as the administrator. Formal announcements of the Pulitzer Prizes are made each April by the president of Columbia University on the recommendation of the Pulitzer Prize Board. More than 2,000 entries are submitted annually in the competitions. Ninety judges are appointed each year to serve on twenty separate juries where they make three nominations in each of the twenty-one current categories for the Pulitzer Prizes.
For a photograph to be nominated for a Pulitzer, it must have appeared in an American daily or weekly newspaper. The prize for photography is given for a distinguished example of breaking news or feature photography in black and white or color, which may consist of a photograph or photographs, a sequence or an album. It has been presented every year except 1946 as the Pulitzer Board deemed no nomination worthy of the award.
Before 1968, there was only one photography category, the Pulitzer Prize for Photography, which was divided into spot news and breaking news and the feature categories.
The Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography has been awarded since 1968 for a distinguished example of feature photography in black and white or color, which may consist of a photograph or photographs, a sequence or an album.
Winners of Pulitzer Prize
1942
Ford Strikers Riot
1942 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Milton Brooks, The Detroit News
Its April 3, 1941, day two of the first United Auto Workers strike at the Ford Motor Co. factory in Detroit. Lines of pickets have closed off all access to the factory. Production has ground to a halt; 120,000 workers are idle. Tensions are running high.
Photographer Milton Brooks joins a crowd of journalists outside the gates. Brooks is an unusual news photographer: Unlike his colleagues, he rarely takes more than one picture at any event, preferring to stand patiently until the most newsworthy image presents itself. Today, as cameras snap and roll all around him. Brooks waits.
Finally, the photographer sees his chance. "1 saw a man pick a fight with some of the pickets," he says. "He had the wrong side of the argument and I could tell from what he said that there would be trouble soon." Fists are clenched, clubs raised. Brooks snaps a single photograph: eight strikers, faces contorted; a lone dissenter, crouching low, his coat pulled over his head. "I took the picture quickly, hid the camera under my coat and ducked into the crowd. A lot of people would have liked to wreck that picture."
1943
Water
1943 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Frank Noel, Associated Press
In January 1942, the war in the Pacific is heating up. The Japanese have leveled Pearl Harbor and are now sweeping the Malaysian Peninsula. Frank "Pappy" Noel is in Singapore, photographing the war for the Associated Press, when Japanese bombers attack. The city is so unprepared that streetcars keep running throughout the raid.
Noel escapes aboard a freighter bound for Burma. The Japanese torpedo the vessel. Trapped in his cabin, Noel uses a heavy chair to batter down the door. He flees with a handful of shipmates. For five days, they drift across the Indian Ocean in flimsy lifeboats, without food or water, baking in the tropical sun.
On day three, another lifeboat comes close: Indian sailors, tired and desperate, beg for water. Noel and his group have none to give. Ill with malaria, exhausted by the ordeal, Noel nonetheless raises his camera and shoots. The boats drift apart. The Indian sailors are never heard from again.
Noel’s lifeboat eventually reaches Sumatra. The photographer and his camera are rescued. Making out his expense report, he writes "One torpedoing—no charge.”
1944
Homecoming
1944 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Earle L. Bunker for The World-Herald, Omaha, NE
Earle Bunker for the World Herald (Omaha), covers the return of Colonel Robert Moore of Villisca, Iowa, on July 15, 1943. At the time, Villisca was a small town, home to about 1000 people.
Tarawa Island
1944 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Frank Filan for Associated Press
The U.S. invasion of Tarawa Atoll on 11 November 1943, left behind dozens of dead Japanese soldiers, as can be seen in the image of Filan, theAssociated Press .
1945
Marines planting the American flag on Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima
[U.S. Marines raise the American flag atop Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima in the South Pacific, February 23, 1945.
Photo by Joe Rosenthal]
Photo by Joe Rosenthal]
1945 Joe Rosenthal of Associated Press
On February 23, 1945, the Marines raised the American flag on Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima, Japan, in what would be one of the most iconic moments of the Allied victory during World War II. There is a controversy about the fact that the photo has been staged to be used as advertising material by the U.S. Army.
About the Photographer:
Rosenthal took an indelible photograph of World War II when he photographed the Marines raising the American flag on Iwo Jima. Ironically, the U.S. Army and Navy had rejected him as a military photographer because of his impaired eyesight. He covered war in the Pacific for the Associated Press. On Iwo Jima, he shot the flag-raising photograph that won the Pulitzer Prize. However, the image generated controversy because the flag replaced a smaller flag that had been raised earlier. Some argued that the event was staged for the camera. Repeatedly, Rosenthal explained that it was not. His career began in San Francisco with the Newspaper Enterprise Association. He served as chief photographer and manager for Times Wide World Photos before it was taken over by the AP. After the war, Rosenthal became a photographer for the San Francisco Chronicle.
1946
(No Award)
1947
Death Leap From Blazing Hotel
1947 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Arnold Hardy, Associated Press
With only five flashbulbs, 26 year old Georgia Tech student Arnold Hardy used his last one to capture this photo of a woman leaping from the Winecoff Hotel fire. Hardy was the first amateur to win a Pulitzer prize.
Its Friday night. Arnold Hardy, like most of his fellow college students, is out having a good time. He arrives home in the early hours of the morning to hear fire trucks racing through the streets. An amateur photographer. Hardy grabs his camera, jumps into a taxi and hurries to the blaze. "I came upon it all at once. Fire was raging from the upper floors. From almost every window, men. women and children screamed tor help."
The Winecoff Hotel has no fire escapes, no fire doors, no fire stairs. The hotel is 15 stories high; the ladders ot the Atlanta Fire Department do not reach above the ninth floor. The blaze spreads rapidly. Guests on the upper floors have no way out. "The trapped victims," remembers Hardy, "were descending ropes of blankets and bed sheets in desperate attempts to reach the fully extended ladders." The sheets tear; people plunge to the pavement. Other guests try jumping
to the building next door; most fall to the street below.
As Hardy watches, he hears a woman shriek. "I looked up, raising my camera. A woman was plummeting downward. As she passed the third floor, I fired, using my last flashbulb."
The woman is lucky: Her fall is broken by a pipe and a railing. She lives.
In all, 119 people lose their lives in the December 7 Winecoff fire — including owner W. F. Winecoff, found dead, along with his wife, in his luxury suite on the 14th floor.
1948
Boy Gunman and Hostage
1948 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Frank Cushing for Boston Traveler
During a job in the suburbs of Boston, Cushing hear a call by police radio.Ed Bancroft, a 15 year old boy had made another boy hostage in an alley trying to escape police. Cushing makes your tasks aside from door to door knocks, until a resident lets go and the back of this house, it can record the scene forward. Ed Bancroft was knocked out by a policeman who comes from behind the fence and was then arrested.
1949
Babe Ruth Retires No. 3
1949 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Nathaniel Fein, New York Herald Tribune
Yankee Stadium, June 13, 1948. The stands are packed. But the fans aren't here just for a baseball game. They've come out to honor one of the greats, baseballs most beloved player: Babe Ruth.
Down on the field. New York Herald Tribune photographer Nat Fein has a close-up view of the home run hero, slumped in the dugout, weakened by illness. "He looked tired, very tired; the power that had been his in his youth and manhood was slowly ebbing away." But as Ruth slowly makes his way onto the field, the crowd goes wild. They give "The Sultan of Swat" a thunderous standing ovation.
Fein takes several pictures, but he isn't satisfied. So he walks around to the other side. "I saw Ruth standing there with his uniform, No. 3, the number that would be retired, and knew that
was the shot. It was a dull day, and most photographers were using flash bulbs, but I slowed the shutter and took the picture without a flash."
The thick shock of hair, the famous number, the cheering fans — Fein's photograph tells the whole story of the Babes bitter-sweet finale. Babe passed away just two months after the photo was taken.
About the Photographer:
Fein grew up in New York and began his career at the Journal American. He taught himself how to take pictures and began to do freelance work. Later, he worked as a staff photographer at theHerald Tribune. After serving in the U.S. Army during World War II, Fein returned to theTribune, when he took the Pulitzer Prize-winning photograph of Babe Ruth's final public appearance two month's before Ruth's death. It is considered on of the best sports photos ever taken. Fein also worked for Look, Life, and other magazines. He won many awards and photographed individuals such as Harry Truman, Albert Einstein, and Eleanor Roosevelt. After theHerald Tribune folded in 1966, Fein joined Orange and Rockland Utilities. He is retired but still takes photographs.
1950
Near Collision at Air Show
1950 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Bill Crouch for Oakland (CA) Tribune
In a presentation, Chet Derby stunt pilot had planned a final number in which he was flying upside down at your twin leaving a smoke trail to a huge B-52 crossed the trail. While Bill Crouch, the Oakland Tribune , tried to make some pictures, something wrong happens. The B-52 came too early and by about 1 meter the two planes do not collide in the air.
1951
Flight of Refugees Across Wrecked Bridge in Korea
1951 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Max Desfor, Associated Press
In October 1950, photographer Max Desfor packs up his 4 x 5 Speed Graphic, straps on a parachute and jumps out of an airplane for the first time. He is covering the Korean War for The Associated Press. "As a war correspondent, I was attached to a military unit," says Desfor. "Whichever one I chose." Desfor picks the 187th Regiment, which parachutes deep into North Korea to try to liberate U.N. prisoners.
The jump is successful; the rescue is not. Desfor stays with his unit, covering its movements in the north. But on Nov. 25, 300,000 Chinese troops swoop across the border to aid their North Korean allies. Within weeks U.N. troops are in retreat, abandoning the North Korean capital of Pyongyang. "Our troops could no longer hold the capital city." remembers Desfor. "We could hear the explosions. Fires raged. I was in a jeep with a couple of other correspondents and we were retreating along with everybody else.''
Desfor and his colleagues head south, crossing the Taedong River on a military pontoon bridge. As they race down the other side of the river, they come upon a bridge that has been bombed into ruin. Undaunted, hundreds of refugees crawl over the twisted metal. The weather is bitter cold; the wind, piercing.
Says Desfor: "It was a fantastic sight. All these people clambering over the girders and the broken girders were dipped down into the icy water." Fingers numbed by cold. Desfor takes only a few shots. One frames the desperation— and determination — of the refugees' flight.
1952
Wilbanks Smith breaking Johnny Bright's jaw
1951 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, John Robinson and Don Ultang for Des Moines Register and Tribune
In a league game for college football, held on October 20, 1951, the player Willbanks Smith breaks the player Johnny Bright's jaw after an attack, recorded through a sequence of six images made by photographers John Robinson and Don Ultang, the Des Moines Register and Tribune . It was the first time a black athlete playing in the field of Oklahoma A & M team of Smith and, after a series of throws hard, Smith hurts the face of Bright in a case that gained contours racist by the way the media handled the case, seeking to minimize aggression.
1953
Hole in the Shoe
1953 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, William M. Gallagher for Flint (MI) Journal
Photo of Gallagher, the Flint Journal , shows the former governor of Michigan and presidential candidate Adlai Stevenson in full presidential campaign of 1952, caught with a hole in the sole of your shoe. Stevenson ran twice for president on the Democratic Party in 1952 and 1956, losing both times to Republican Dwight Eisenhower. In his third attempt in 1960, lost the Democratic primary for John Kennedy, who was elected president at the time.
1954
Truck Accident
1954 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Mrs. Walter M. Schau
Mrs. Walter M. Schau, an amateur photographer, from San Anselmo, California, recorded with a Kodak Box Brownie camera when the truck driver Paul Overby was rescued with a rope, who ran after the vehicle had suffered an accident and have been hanging on a bridge.The other occupant of the cabin, Hank Baum, was also rescued before walking on fire and fall on the rocks below the bridge.
The picture being published in the Akron Beacon Journal and other newspapers and nationally distributed by the AP.
It was the first Pulitzer photography prize won by a woman.
1955
Tragedy by the Sea
1955 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, John L. Gaunt, Los Angeles Times
April 2, J 954. Los Angeles Times photographer John Gaunt lounges in his front yard in Hermosa Beach, Calif., enjoying the sun. Suddenly, a neighbor calls out. "There was some excitement on the beach," says Gaunt. "I grabbed a RoIIeiflex camera and ran."
Down by the water, Gaunt finds a distraught young couple by the shoreline. Moments before, their 19-month-old son was playing happily in their yard. Somehow, he wandered down to the beach. He was swept away by the fierce tide.
The little boy is gone. There is nothing anyone can do. Gaunt, who has a daughter about the same age, takes four quick photographs of the grieving couple. "As I made the last exposure, they turned and walked away" he says. The little boys body is later recovered from the surf."
1956
Bomber Crashes in Street
1956 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Staff of New York Daily News
On November 3, 1955, published a series of images taken by the team of New York Daily News, who documented the fall of a B-26. A team of photographers, among whom was photographer George Mattson, took the photograph: "Bomber Crashes in Street" (above).
Despite falling into a residential area, the pilots of the B-26 (the only one who died in the crash) got away from homes and avoid more deaths.
1957
Sinking of the SS Andrea Doria
1957 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Harry Trask, Boston Traveler
Its passengers are enjoying their last night at sea — dining, dancing, playing cards — as the luxury liner Andrea Doria sails through fog-bound waters. It is 11 p.m., July 25. 1956. The ship is just off Nantucket; it should be in New York by morning.
Cruising out of New York harbor is the Stockholm, a Swedish-American liner, its prow heavily reinforced against winter ice. Each ship spots the other on radar. Roth radar screens indicate they will pass safely.
Within minutes something goes horribly wrong. With a sudden shock of impact and screech of ripping metal, the Stockholm tears a 40-foot hole in the Andrea Doria's starboard side. Water gushes in. Passengers race about. The crew lowers lifeboats. A massive evacuation begins.
The next morning, a chartered Beechcraft Bonanza circles low over the abandoned liner. Inside is Boston Traveler photographer Harry Trask, who missed an earlier journalists' flyover. As the tiny plane clips and turns, Trask becomes violently airsick. He shoots anyway.
"I asked the pilot to make several passes... so I could record it with my Graphic. As we circled, I could see the stack gradually sink below the surface. As the air from the cabins rose to the surface, the water foamed. Debris and empty lifeboats were scattered even-where. In nine minutes, it was all over." The tardy, airsick news photographer takes 16 photographs. One shows the Andrea Doria. propeller aloft, just before it sinks in 225 feet of water. (The second picture in the sequence is cited as the key photograph-above.)
Sixteen hundred and fifty passengers survive the wreck. Fifty-one others are lost beneath the sea.
1958
Faith and Confidence
1958 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, William C. Beall for the Washington Daily News
Beall's photo of a policeman patiently reasoning with a two-year-old boy trying to cross a street during a parade was the most-applauded picture ever to appear in theWashington Daily News.
About the Photographer:
He started his career at the age of sixteen, working for a photo agency. He later worked as a photographer for theWashington Post and then the Washington Daily News. He was named chief photographer in 1940. Beall worked as a combat photographer with the U.S. Marines during World War II. He won the Air Medal in 1945 for his coverage of the battle for Okinawa. His credits include awards from the National Headliners Club, the United Press International News Pictures Contest, and the National Press Photographers Association.
1959
Wheels of Death
1959 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, William Seaman for Minneapolis Star
Seaman reported to the Minneapolis Star the accident in which a boy died after being hit while playing with his stand on the street.
1960
Andrew Lopez - Last Rites
[From the series of four photographs of a corporal, Andrew Lopez , formerly of Dictator Batista's army, who was executed by a Castro firing squad, the above principal picture showing the condemned man receiving last rites.]
1960 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Andrew Lopez of United Press International
The photographer Andrew Lopez (United Press International) followed the revolutionary process in Cuba that overthrew the dictator Fulgencio Batista. After assuming power, troops led by Fidel Castro and Che Guevara began a series of trials of Batista allies, where dozens of people were shot. Lopez held a series of four images of a trial, before being forced to stop shooting.The second image of the series (above) shows a corporal, Andrew Lopez , formerly of Dictator Batista's army, who was executed by a Castro firing squad receiving last rites from a priest before being executed.
1961
Tokyo Stabbing
1961 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Yasushi Nagao, United Press International
It's election season in Japan — time for discussion, argument and debate. On Oct. 12, I960, 3,000 people cram Tokyo's Hibiya Hall to hear Socialist Partv Chairman Inejiro Asanuma battle it out with Liberal-Democratic Prime Minister Hayato Ikeda. Reporters, TV crews and photographers crowd the stage; one of them is Yasushi Nagao, photographer for the Mamichi Shimbun.
Chairman Asanuma lambastes the Japanese government for its mutual defense treaty with the United States. Right-wing students begin to heckle and shout, throwing wads of paper at the burly party chairman. The police rush to quell the unrest. The press follows, except for Nagao, who, with only one shot left in his camera, stays close to the stage.
Suddenly, right-wing student Otoya Yamaguchi rushes out. "1 thought Yamaguchi was carrying a brown stick to strike Asanuma," Nagao remembers. With a jolt, Nagao realizes the slender figure is wielding a Japanese samurai sword. Before anyone can stop him, Yamaguchi plunges the sword into the chairman. Asanuma staggers. Yamaguchi pulls out the blade. Nagao lifts his camera. As the photographer uses his last frame, Yamaguchi spears Asanuma again — through the heart.
1962
Serious Steps
1962 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Paul Vathis, Associated Press
In 22nd April 1961, the young administration of John F. Kennedy is wobbling. The disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion is generating fallout worldwide: Cuba's Fidel Castro is furious. Soviet leader Nikita Krushchev presses the advantage. Americans question Kennedy's ability to lead.
Seeking counsel. Kennedy retreats to Camp David with his predecessor, Dwight D. Eisenhower. The two leaders pose for photographs. Associated Press photographer Paul Vathis takes the requisite shots. "I was right in front of them,' says Vathis. "I heard Ike tell Kennedy, I know a place where we can talk."' The new president and the former general head away from the throng.
Most of the reporters and photographers are on their way out. But as Vathis kneels to pack his camera, he glances up. "There were just two of them, all by themselves, their heads bowed, walking up the path. They looked so lonely."
Press Secretary Pierre Salinger says no more pictures. But Vathis cant resist. He grabs his camera and gets off two quick shots — right between the legs of a surprised Secret Service agent. The press secretary is not pleased.
"Pierre said 'I told you guvs to leave this alone,' and I said, "I'm just changing my film." Vathis has captured a rare, unguarded moment — a young president, the weight of the world on his shoulders, and the man he replaced, lending a hand.
1963
Aid From The Padre
[A priest holding a wounded soldier in the 1962 Venezuelan insurrection: "Aid From The Padre." The photograph was distributed by the Associated Press.]
1963 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Hector Rondon of La Republica, Caracas, Venezuela
The photograph distributed by the Associated Press.
During the fighting an insurrection promoted by Venezuelan Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional, Father Luis Padillo was in the crossfire and, despite the danger, insisted on giving the last sacrament to all the dying soldiers. Rondos, for the daily La Republica, took this photograph of Padillo sheltering a wounded soldier in the midst of shooting.
1964
Jack Ruby shoots Lee Harvey Oswald
1964 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Robert Jackson, Dallas Times Herald
November 22, 1963. Dallas Times Herald photographer Robert Jackson is riding through the streets of Dallas in President John F. Kennedy's motorcade. "I'd only been at the paper three years, so I was pretty new at it all," remembers Jackson. "It was really exciting time."
The crowd is cheering, flags are flying, Jackson is snapping photographs, he stops to change film. In that instant, the world changes. Jackson hears a shot. then another, and another. Bedlam erupts. " The scene was confusion, people running, covering up their kids," says Jackson. "I knew somebody was shooting at the president." Looking up at the Texas School Book Depository, Jackson sees a rifle at a window. But he has no film in his camera, less than an hour later, the president is dead.
Throughout the weekend, Jackson pursues the story. On Sunday, he shows up at the Dallas Police headquarters to photograph suspect Lee Harvey Oswald being transferred to the county jail. "I walked right in. There was no security to speak of. Nobody checked my press pass."
In the basement garage. Jackson picks his spot. "I Pre-focused on about 10 feet where I knew that I would be able to get a clean shot. They said. 'Here he comes' and they brought him out." Jackson raises his camera. Suddenly, someone steps in front of him. "My first reaction was, "This guys getting in my way.' Ruby took two steps and fired —and I guess I fired about the same time."
Jackson's photograph shows Jack Ruby killing Lee Harvey Oswald —for many, a final denouement in one or the most tragic events in American history.
About the Photographer:
Jackson studied business in college but later returned to his hobbies of photography and sports car racing. He was the official photographer for the Texas region of the Sports Car Club of America. In 1960 the Dallas Times Herald hired him as a staff photographer. It was while working for this newspaper that he took the picture of Jack Ruby shooting Lee Harvey Oswald. In 1968 Jackson worked for the Denver Post, but he returned to the Times Herald for a time. He later did freelance work before joining the Colorado Springs Gazette. Jackson is now retired.
1965
Vietnam War
1965 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Horst Faas of Associated Press
Horst Faas, the Associated Press , was famous for his photographs of the Vietnam War in 1964. The image above depicts a father holding his son, a small child covered in napalm burns. The photograph was taken on March 19, 1964, shortly after Vietnamese forces had devastated a small village where suspected communist Viet Cong were hiding. The attack killed dozens of innocent people.
1966
Vietnamese Mother and Children Flee Bombing Village
1966 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Kyoichi Sawada for United Press International
A Vietnamese family escapes from a U.S. bombing and swims across a river at the village of Thuong LOC, Binh Dinh province. It is estimated that more than 90,000 Vietnamese civilians were killed by American attacks during the war, due to extensive use of firearms and bombs in crowded civilian sites.
1967
Shooting of James Meredith
1967 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Jack R. Thornell, Associated Press
It has been four years since James Meredith became the first African-American to attend the University ot Mississippi— with the intervention of the U.S. attorney general U.S. marshals and the National Guard. Determined to prove that black Americans can pursue their civil rights without fear. Meredith decides to walk the length of Mississippi to encourage African-American's to vote.
It is the second day of the walk—June 6, 1966, two years alter three civil rights workers were killed in Mississippi. The state is deeply divided by racial hatred. Meredith is unarmed, accompanied by a handful of supporters, a few police officers and some journalists. One of them is Jack Thornell of The Associated Press. "The press wasn't really walking with him." says Thornell. "We were leapfrogging ahead in cars."
Thornell and two other photographers are parked by the side of the road as Meredith approaches. Suddenly, a voice calls out: "James. I just want James Meredith." A white man stands, leveling a 16-gauge shotgun.
Says Thornell, "I was sitting in the car when we heard the shot. By the time we got out. Meredith was going down. We were in the line of fire. We were trying to protect our heads. We weren't taking a lot of photographs." But as Meredith crawls painfully to the side of the road. Thornell manages to capture his outraged agony on film.
Galvanized by the shooting, black leaders Martin Luther King Jr. and Stokely Carmichael take up the cause. Meredith recovers and rejoins the march, which is now 18,000 strong. The term "black power" is born.
1968
Winner in Feature Photography: Toshio Sakai, United Press International, for Vietnam combat photograph "Dreams of Better Times."
Winner in Spot Photography: Rocco Morabito, for "The Kiss of Life" depicting a power company lineman giving a colleague mouth-to-mouth resuscitation.
Winner in Feature Photography
Dreams of Better Times
1968 Pulitzer Prize, Photography, Toshio Sakai, United Press International
Being a soldier in Vietnam meant trudging through unfamiliar countryside, knowing the next moment could mean obliteration by a booby trap or a mine. It meant numbing boredom, followed by terrifying struggle.
On June I7, 1967, Japanese photojournalist Toshio Sakai crouches with the men of B Company, about 40 miles northeast of Saigon. They are dug in behind sandbags and mud banks, surrounded by deep jungle. It is Sakai’s first tour of Vietnam: "There was a commotion in the forest, then all became silent. Birds stopped chirping and insects quieted. My heart was beating fast. A tense atmosphere filled the air."
Suddenly, shells explode overhead. AK-47s crackle. It’s a Viet Cong attack. The Americans return the fire. The jungle explodes with bullets. But in the midst of battle, the heavens open up. The downpour is so intense it forces both sides to stop shooting. Minutes pass, then hours. The soldiers hunker down.
Despite the miserable wet, Sakai remembers it as a moment of peace: "I saw a black soldier lying on the bunker and taking a nap. Behind him, I saw another white soldier holding an M-16 rifle, crouching and watching. The sleeping soldier must have dreamt of better times in his homeland. I quietly released the shutter."
Winner in Spot Photography
The Kiss of Life
1968 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Rocco Morabito, Jacksonville Journal
July 17, 1967: Air conditioners hum all over Horida. In Jacksonville, they overwhelm the electrical system and knock out the power. Jacksonville Journal photographer Rocco Morabito is on his way to photograph a railroad strike when he notices Jacksonville Electric Authority linemen high up on the poles. "I passed these men working and went on to my assignment," says Morabito. "I took eight pictures at the strike. I thought I'd go back and see if I could rind another picture."
But when Morabito gets back to the linemen, "I heard screaming. I looked up and I saw this man hanging down. Oh my God. I didn't know what to do." The linemen. Randall Champion, is dangling upside down in his safety belt — felled bv 4,160 volts of electricity.
"I took a picture right quick." says Morabito. "J.D. Thompson (another lineman) was running toward the pole. I went to my car and called an ambulance. I got back to the pole and J.D. was breathing into Champion." Cradling the stricken lineman in his arms, Thompson rhythmically pushes air into Champion's lungs. Below. Morabito makes pictures — and prays.
"I backed off. way off until I hit a house and I couldn't go any farther. I took another picture, it is a prize-winning photograph, but Morahito's real concern is the injured lineman. Thompson finally shouts down: "He's breathing." Champion survives.
1969
Winner in Feature Photography: Moneta Sleet Jr., Ebony, for photograph of Martin Luther King Jr.'s widow and child, taken at King's funeral.
Winner in Spot Photography: Edward T. Adams, Associated Press, for "Saigon Execution."
Winner in Feature Photography
Deep Sorrow
Photographed by Moneta Sleet, Ebony Magazine
Moneta Sleet is there in 1955 when Martin Luther King Jr., organizes the Montgomery, Ala., bus boycott. He is there in 1964 when King wins the Nobel Peace Prize. He is there in 1965 when King leads the march from Selma to Montgomery, and he is there on April 9, 1968, when the nation mourns the great civil rights leader at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta.
It has been just five days since a snipers bullet killed the civil rights leader. Coretta Scott King has discovered that the pool of journalists covering her husband's funeral does not include a black photographer. She sends word: If Moneta Sleet is not allowed into the church, there will be no photographers.
Sleet cakes a prime position, close to the family "I looked over and saw Mrs. King consoling her daughter. I was photographing the child as she was fidgeting on her mamas lap. Professionally I was doing what I had been trained to do, and I was glad of that because I was very involved emotionally. If I hadn't been there working, I would have been off crying like everybody else.
Winner in Spot Photography
Saigon Execution
1969 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Edward Adams, Associated Press
Jan. 30. 1968. North Vietnamese communists launch their massive Tet offensive, bringing the fighting right into the U.S. Embassy compound in Saigon. Thirty-six hours later. Associated Press photographer Eddie Adams, working with an NBC News crew, comes upon two South Vietnamese soldiers escorting a prisoner through the streets of Saigon.
They walked him down to the street corner. We were taking pictures. He turned out to be a Viet Cong lieutenant. And out of nowhere came this guy who we didn't know. I was about five feet away and he pulled out his pistol."
The man with the pistol is Gen. Nguyen Ngoc Loan, chief of South Vietnam's national police. It all
happens very fast: The general raises his pistol. Adams raises his camera. Loan presses his pistol against the prisoner's temple. He fires. Adams releases the shutter.
Loan "'shot him in the head and walked away." Adams remembers. "And walked by us and said, "They killed many of my men and many of our people."' For Loan, the shooting is an act of justice: The Viet Cong lieutenant had just murdered a South Vietnamese colonel, his wife and their six children.
The American anti-war movement adopts the photograph as a symbol of the excesses of the war. But Adams feels his picture is misunderstood. "If you re this man. this general, and you just caught this guy after he killed some of your people.... How do you know you wouldn't have pulled that trigger yourself? You have to put yourself in that situation----It's a war."
1970
Winner in Feature Photography: Dallas Kinney, Palm Beach Post (West Palm Beach, Florida), for portfolio of pictures of Florida migrant workers, "Migration to Misery."
Winner in Spot Photography: Steve Starr, Associated Press (Albany bureau, New York), for photo taken at Cornell University, "Campus Guns."
Winners in Feature Photography
Migration to Misery
1970 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Dallas Kinney, Palm Beach Post (West Palm Beach, Florida)
Winners in Spot Photography
Campus Guns
1970 Pulitzer Prize, Spot Photography, Steve Starr, Associated Press
1971
Winner in Feature Photography: Jack Dykinga, Chicago Sun-Times, for photographs at the Lincoln and Dixon State Schools for the Retarded in Illinois.
Winner in Spot Photography: John Paul Filo, Valley Daily News and Daily Dispatch (Tarentum and New Kensington, Pennsylvania), for pictorial coverage of the Kent State University tragedy.
Winner in Feature Photography
The “Mentally Ill” in Illinois
[Photographs at the Lincoln and Dixon State Schools for the Retarded in Illinois]
1971 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Jack Dykinga, Chicago Sun-Times
Jack Dykinga’s photographic portfolio, based upon the particular manner in which he experienced being faced with the overwhelming images of utterly discarded human beings, the mentally-ill who were warehoused in the back wards of state mental hospitals, represented a step toward an understanding of co-constructed meaning, a sense of which is embedded in “Because He is, I am.”
About the Photographer:
Jack Dykinga was the first Chicago Sun-Times photographer ever to win the Pulitzer Prize. He was honored for a series of photographs that was taken in April and July 1970 at state schools for the mentally retarded in the Illinois downstate towns of Dixon and Lincoln.
Dykinga spent three days at the schools. “It was a real shock to my senses, like nothing I had ever seen before,” he later said. “For the first hour and a half, I didn’t take any pictures at all. I just watched and was overcome by horror.”
Dykinga said that he was rushed. “We went from cottage to cottage, and I think some of the patients there reacted the way small children react. They were curious, you know, and they would reach out and touch the camera.”
After the photographs were published, there was a large public outcry of outrage and dismay. In response, Illinois state government officials canceled plans that they had previously put into place to reduce funding supporting the State Department of Mental Health.
Winner in Spot Photography
Kent State University Massacre
1971 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, John Paul Filo, Valley Daily News and Daily Dispatch
Spring 1970, Student activists tear up campuses across America. Things are quiet at Ohio's Kent State University — until police break up a rowdy beer bash. Twenty-four hours later, 800 students demonstrate on the university commons. Someone throws a lighted railroad flare into the ROTC building. Firefighters arrive. Students hurl rocks and cut hoses. The building burns to the ground.
When photojournalism student John Filo shows up for classes on Monday morning, there are 500 National Guard troops on campus. Disappointed that he missed the weekend action, Filo grabs his camera and heads for a student demonstration scheduled on the commons.
The campus bell rings. The rally begins. Soon. National Guardsmen appear and order the demonstrators to disperse. Students shout "Pigs off campus!"' They throw rocks. The Guardsmen form two lines and tire tear gas canisters into the crowd. The students throw more rocks. The Guardsmen retreat up a hill. At the top. the troopers suddenly kneel, aim and fire.
Filo thinks they are shooting blanks. Then he sees a bullet hit a metal sculpture and smack into a tree. Around him. students fall to the pound. A boy lies in a puddle of blood. "A girl came up and knelt over the body and let out a God-awful scream. That made me click the camera."
Thirteen students are injured. Four die. Eight troopers are eventually indicted in the killings. No one is ever convicted.
1972
Winner in Feature Photography: David Hume Kennerly, United Press International, for dramatic photographs of the Vietnam War during 1971.
Winner in Spot Photography: Horst Faas and Michel Laurent, Associated Press, for picture series "Death in Dacca."
Winner in Feature Photography
1972 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography,David Hume Kennerly, United Press International
Winner in Spot Photography
Death in Dacca
1972 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Horst Faas and Michel Laurent, Associated Press
1973
Winner in Feature Photography: Brian Lanker, Topeka Capital-Journal, for sequence on childbirth.
Winner in Spot Photography: Huynh Cong Ut, Associated Press, for "The Terror of War," depicting children in flight from a napalm bombing.
Winner in Feature Photography
Moment of Life
1973 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Brian Lanker, Topeka Capital-Journal
In the early 1970s, the Lamaze method of natural childbirth was relatively new and unusual — not only in Topeka but also much of the country. Brian Lanker’s photo essay went on to win the Pulitzer Prize for feature photography. The centerpiece of the essay was the “Moment of Life” photograph above showing a joyful Lynda Coburn and her newly born baby with umbilical cord still intact.
About the Photographer:
Mr. Lanker made a name for himself in the early 1970s at The Topeka Capital-Journal, when that paper was a training ground and showcase for some of the ablest talent in photojournalism. “I wasn’t attracted to him — he was attracted to us,” recalled Rich Clarkson, who was the director of photography at The Capital-Journal during that golden era in Kansas. (A portfolio was posted on 20 in the Car, a tribute to Mr. Clarkson organized last year by Mr. Lanker.)
It started with what seemed to be a cold-call job pitch to Mr. Clarkson in 1970. The photo director soon learned that Mr. Lanker had already scouted out the paper thoroughly from Phoenix. He had been reading The Capital-Journal for about a year (not as easy to do then as it is now, children — you had to take out what we used to call a subscription). He’d been speaking with other staff members by phone about working there. And he’d arranged to travel to Topeka so he could stop in and visit Mr. Clarkson in person.
“Even at the time, he had that intensity and intelligence,” Mr. Clarkson said. “I thought, ‘If he does everything like this, he’d be pretty good.’”
[Carl DavazBrian Lanker at home in Eugene, Ore., last July after a gathering of Topeka Capital-Journal alumni in honor of Rich Clarkson.]
“He was constantly thinking,” Mr. Clarkson said.
One day, Mr. Lanker proposed a photo essay for the Sunday family section, which Mr. Clarkson was trying to wrest from the realm of society coverage. The idea was that Mr. Lanker would attend a class in the Lamaze method of natural child-bearing, pick one of the couples and follow them through the delivery of their baby.
The key image of his essay, “Moment of Life,” showed freshly born Jacki Coburn, umbilical cord still intact, upon her ecstatic mother. As Mr. Clarkson remembered, it ran the full width of the cover of the family section one Sunday, occupying about one-third of the whole page — “just the way we wanted it.”
When it appeared, however, it was not so much to the taste of the publisher, Oscar S. Stauffer, who made his views warmly clear in a telephone call that morning to the city editor.
Months later, news that “Moment of Life” had won the 1973 Pulitzer Prize for feature photography began to chatter across The Associated Press teletype machines in the Topeka newsroom. The publisher was invited to have a look at the wire story for himself. He professed not to remember the prize-winning image. The city editor reminded him, “It’s the picture you told us we never should have published.”
The Coburns were invited to join the Pulitzer celebration at a steakhouse that night and, over time, Ms. Coburn discovered she had more in common with Mr. Lanker than she had with her own husband. The Coburns divorced and she married Mr. Lanker. She survives him, as do their daughters Jacki and Julie Coburn and their son, Dustin Lanker.
The impact of “Moment in Life,” and of Mr. Lanker’s tenure at The Register-Guard, went far beyond local audiences. James Estrin, a colleague at The Times and on Lens, told me he felt the impact in New York three decades ago.
His photographs of childbirth were the first that many people had seen. At that time, almost no father went into a delivery room. It was extraordinary that a newspaper would publish this and that you could tell this in a photo essay.
Brian told stories very intimately. He influenced a generation of younger photographers, who went off to smaller papers around the country. One didn’t have to travel the world to tell important stories. I went to Jackson, Miss., in 1981, believing that what was important was the opportunity to tell stories in photos.
Mr. Lanker drove from Topeka to Eugene to take over his new job in 1974, following the route of the 19th-century Oregon Trail as closely as he could. He showed up for work with a photo essay already in hand on what the trail now looked like.
“He thought first about the reader,” Mr. Davaz said, “and his magical skills of bringing words-and-pictures journalism together is very much at the heart of the legacy of visual journalism we aspire to practice at The Register-Guard to this day. Many people — far and wide — know about this newspaper because of the heart Brian Lanker brought to it.”
In recent years, as a freelancer, Mr. Lanker took on high-profile advertising clients to bankroll the important work he thought needed to be done, like preserving for posterity the legacy of artists who had been commissioned to paint combat scenes in World War II.
Trivia
Interestingly, he later married the woman, Lynda, who was the subject of "Moment of Life". He is also known for his book "I Dream a World: Portraits of Black Women Who Changed America".
Winner in Spot Photography
The Terror of War
1973 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Huynh Cong "Nick" Út, Associated Press
It rails from the sky, a thick, caustic gel, sticking to anything it touches — thatched roofs, bare skin — then burning, burning. Napalm: Everyone who is in Vietnam during the war sees it. For Nick Ut, a young Vietnamese photographer working for The Associated Press, the experience is life-altering.
Ut has lost his older brother to the war. He himself has been wounded three times. On June 8, 1972, he sets out to cover a battle raging near Trang Bang, 25 miles west of Saigon. "Really heavy fighting." he says. "I shot Vietnamese bombing all morning, the rockets and mortar." Determined to eliminate an entrenched Viet Cong unit. South Vietnamese planes dive low, dropping napalm. But one plane misses. Fire rains down on South Vietnamese soldiers and civilians. Women and children rim screaming. A mother carries a badly burned child. "The one mother with the baby, she died right in my camera. I hear four or five children screaming, Please help! Please help!"
As Ut furiously snaps photographs, a young girl runs toward him — arms outstretched, eyes clenched in pain, clothes burned off by napalm. "She said. 'Too hot, please help me.' I say yes,’ and take her to the hospital."
The girl. Phan Thi Kim Phuc, survives. She grows up, gets married. Through the years, she and Ut stay in touch, brought together by a moment of tragedy.
1974
Winner in Feature Photography: Slava Veder, Associated Press, for photo of return of an American prisoner of war from captivity in North Vietnam.
Winner in Spot Photography: Anthony K. Roberts, free-lance photographer, for picture series "Fatal Hollywood Drama."
Winner in Feature Photography
POW Returns From Vietnam
1974 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Slava Veder, Associated Press
"The day was overcast, no shadows. The light was beautiful." Its March 17, 1973, a perfect California day. Associated Press photographer Sal Veder waits on the tarmac at Travis Air Force Base. Around him, a crowd seethes with excitement: Families are about to be reunited with long-absent fathers, husbands, uncles and brothers — American prisoners of war just released from captivity in North Vietnam.
One of those POWs is Col. Robert L Stirm of the U.S. Air Force. Stirm was shot down over Hanoi and badly wounded. His family has waited almost six years, not knowing whether they would see him again.
A giant C-141 taxis toward the crowd. The men disembark, alert and solemn in new dress uniforms. "To sec them come home brought tears to a lot of peoples eyes," says Veder. "Some of the photographers were pretty well shaken up, as I was, too."
Stirm is the last man off. Briefly, he addresses the crowd. "Thank you for this enthusiastic reception ---- God bless you and God bless America.”
As Stirm finishes speaking, Veder notices: "There was motion. The family had started to run toward him, and that's what caught my eye." Veder raises his camera, Stirm sees his children running toward him, Veder clicks the shutter: a burst of joy, captured in one frame. Stirm's son remembers: "It was just this overwhelming feeling. He finally made it back.”
About the Photographer:
Veder began his reporting career when he informed a journalist on his hometown newspaper that he wrote better than people working for the paper and the newspaper hired him. After working as a reporter and photographer on several California newspapers, he took a job at the Tulsa World. He returned to California and worked for the Oakland Tribune. Veder was a staff photographer for the Associated Press when he won the Pulitzer for his photo of Lt. Col. Robert L. Stirm's reunion with his family, whom he had not seen for six years. The photo was taken at Travis Air Force Base in California. Veder clearly recognizes that great photographs require a lucky combination of time, place, and circumstance. Now retired, Veder lives in California and volunteers with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection.
Winner in Spot Photography
Fatal Hollywood Drama
1974 Pulitzer Prize, Spot Photography, Anthony K. Roberts
Anthony K. Roberts, a free-lance photographer of Beverly Hills, CA - For his picture series, "Fatal Hollywood Drama," in which an alleged kidnapper was killed.
1975
Winner in Feature Photography: Matthew Lewis, Washington Post, for photographs in color and black and white.
Winner in Spot Photography: Gerald H. Gay, Seattle Times, for photograph of four exhausted firemen, "Lull in the Battle."
Winner in Feature Photography
1974 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Matthew Lewis, Washington Post
Matthew Lewis was the first photographer at the Washington Post ever to win a Pulitzer Prize when he did so in 1975 for a portfolio of his color pictures. Now “retired” and living in Thomasville, NC, Lewis is coming to the University Libraries at UNCG to display and talk about some of his favorite photos. Jeri Rowe of the News & Record will moderate the discussion in the Reading Room on the first floor of Jackson Library, beginning at 5 p.m. Sponsored by the Friends of the UNCG Libraries.
Winner in Spot Photography
Lull in the Battle
1975 Pulitzer Prize, Spot Photography, Gerald H. Gay, Seattle Times
1976
Winner in Feature Photography: Staff photographers, Courier-Journal and Louisville Times, for comprehensive pictorial report on busing in Louisville's schools
Winner in Spot Photography: Stanley J. Forman, Boston Herald American, for sequence of photographs of a fire in Boston
Winner in Feature Photography
[Third-grade students Mark Stewart, left, and Darrell Hughes greeted each other at Greenwood Elementary School on Sept. 4, 1975]
1976 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Staff photographers, Courier-Journal and Louisville Times
About the Photographer
Bill Luster is a photojournalist based in Louisville, Kentucky. He works at The Courier-Journal, Kentucky's largest newspaper. He is the 2010 winner of the Sprague Award, the highest honor in photojournalism given by the National Press Photographers Association. In 1976 he was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography along with other members of the photography staff for work on court ordered busing in Jefferson County Schools. In 1989 he shared in another Pulitzer Prize , this time for Local Reporting, for the coverage of the nation’s worst drunken driving accident. He has also worked for National Geographic Magazine, National Geographic Traveler, Life, Time, Sports Illustrated, Newsweek, Boys Life, The Washington Post Magazine, and The New York Times Magazine .
Winner in Spot Photography
Boston Fire
1976 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Stanley J. Forman, Boston Herald American
It's quitting time on a brutally hot day in July when Boston Herald American photographer Stanley Forman hears a report of a fire in Boston’s Back Bay. He follows screaming fire trucks to a six-story apartment house in flames.
Forman remembers "a roaring, roaring inferno... heavy smoke. Heavy fire. It was like a firestorm."
Forman runs to the back of the building. "Then I spotted them. A woman, a child and they re standing there on the fire escape, 10 feet from the fire itself. And they're looking for help." As Forman watches, a firefighter climbs down from the roof. He pulls them away from the flames, shielding them with his heavy rubber coat. Seeking a better vantage point, Forman climbs onto a ladder truck.
"Everything was fine," says Forman. "I was just shooting a routine rescue. Switching lenses, switching cameras." A ladder rises slowly toward the fire escape. The firefighter reaches out to grab the ladder....
"All of a sudden, boom! It just crashes." As Forman watches, the fire escape rips away from the building. The woman is falling, the child is falling, metal is flying...
"Everything is falling and I'm thinking. Just keep shooting.' And I'm shooting and shooting. Then a bell went off in my head. I didn’t want to see them hit." Forman turns away. When he turns back, he discovers the 19-year-old woman is dead. Her 3-year-old niece miraculous survives.
1977
Winner in Feature Photography: Robin Hood, Chattanooga News-Free Press, for photo of a disabled veteran and his child at an Armed Forces Day parade.
Winner in Spot Photography: Neal Ulevich, Associated Press, for series of photographs of disorder and brutality in the streets of Bangkok.
Stanley J. Forman, Associated Press, for "Soiling of Old Glory," showing a youth using t he flag as a lance in street disorders.
Stanley J. Forman, Associated Press, for "Soiling of Old Glory," showing a youth using t he flag as a lance in street disorders.
Winner in Feature Photography
Moment of Reflection
1977 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Robin Hood, Chattanooga News-Free Press
By the spring of 1976, the Vietnam War is over. But its effects are deeply embedded in the lives of millions. Robin Hood learned a trade in Vietnam — he went over as an Army information officer and came back as a photographer. Eddie Robinson served in Vietnam, too. But the war took something away from him: his legs.
The two veterans cross paths at the Armed Forces Day Parade in Chattanooga, Tenn., on May 15, 1976. Hood is walking along the sidelines, taking pictures for the Chattanooga News-Free Press. "I had just finished photographing a group of small Vietnamese children who had been relocated to Chattanooga as war refugees and were now watching the parade and waving small American flags."
Then Hood sees Robinson, in army fatigues, a rain poncho — and a wheelchair. "The thought occurred to me that here was a man who had made a supreme sacrifice for the freedom of those (Vietnamese) children-" Hood releases the shutter. Robinson wistfully watches the parade and protects a child from the rain.
Winner in Spot Photography
Brutality in Bangkok
1977 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Neal Ulevich, Associated Press
1977 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Neal Ulevich, Associated Press
October 1976: Thailand's third government in two years teeters on the brink, rocked by clashes between right-wing vocational students and left-wing university students. Late one night, two liberal students are lynched.
Associated Press photographer Neal Ulevich covered the Vietnam War for five years. But nothing he saw in the jungle prepared him for the morning of Oct. 6, when right-wing students attack left-wing students near the university. "When I got there, it was getting more and more violent. Paramilitary troops heavily armed with recoilless rifles showed up. The left-wing students were not armed and were not shooting back. They took refuge in the university buildings."
"Tremendous volleys of automatic weapons were fired across the soccer fields into the classrooms. There were bodies all over, glass breaking. There was no place to take cover. I was very scared."
Finally, the left-wing students surrender. Ulevich heads for the gates, anxious to get his pictures back to his office. "I saw some commotion in the trees. I walked down there and I saw a body hanging. He was certainly dead, but the crowd was so enraged that a man was hitting the body on the head with a folding chair. I stood there to see if anybody was looking at me. Nobody was. I took a few frames and walked away."
In the end, an irony: "When I won the Pulitzer, the Bangkok papers noted it on Page One. They were very proud that a photographer from Bangkok had won the Pulitzer. They didn't show the pictures."
The Soiling of Old Glory
[Anti-busing demonstration at City Hall in Boston, April 6, 1976, showing a protesters using the American flag as a lance. Forman took this while working for theBoston Herald American.]
1977 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Stanley Foreman, Boston Herald American
At Bostons City Hall, 200 white students demonstrate against plans to bus children to integrate the city's schools.
When Boston Herald American photographer Stanley Forman arrives to cover the rally, he finds that "everything appeared to be over. There had been a Pledge of Allegiance. Suddenly. I saw a group of youngsters. They were mixed racially. There was some pushing and shoving."
Forman spots Theodore Landsmark, executive director of the Contractor's Association of Boston, heading toward City Hall. Landsmark is black; the students are white. Suddenly, "everything started to happen in front of me." The white students attack Landsmark, punching and kicking him.
Through his viewfinder, Forman sees a student running with a flagpole dangling a large American flag. As others in the crowd hold Landsmark, the student strikes him repeatedly with the pole. "I was making pictures of Landsmark being hit, and I saw him going down and rolling over. He was being hit with the flagpole. I switched lenses to get him escaping from the crowd.
Police officers intervene, but not before Forman has recorded the moment that an American flag, symbol of liberty, is used as a weapon of racial hatred.
1978
Winner in Feature Photography: J. Ross Baughman, Associated Press, for three photographs from guerrilla areas in Rhodesia.
Winner in Spot Photography: John H. Blair, special assignment photographer, United Press International, for photo of an Indianapolis broker being held hostage at gunpoint.
Winner in Feature Photography
Anti-Guerrilla Operations in Rhodesia
1978 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, J. Ross Baughman, Associated Press
Ross Baughman wears a military uniform and carries a rifle. He rides the Rhodesian back country on horseback. But he is not a soldier. He is a photographer for The Associated Press.
It is 1977. The white Rhodesian government is under intense pressure from the country's disenfranchised black majority. Baughman travels with a rugged cavalry unit. Grey's Scouts. Their mission: to seek out anti-government guerrillas and destroy them.
The villagers will not give up the guerrillas. So the scouts resort to torture. "They force them to line up in push-up stance," Baughman remembers. "They're holding that position for 45 minutes in the sun. many of them starting to shake violently."
The soldiers warn that the first man who falls will be taken away. "Eventually, the first guy fell. They took him around the back of the building, knocked him out and fired a shot into the air. They continued bringing men to the back of the building. The poor guy on the end started crying and going crazy and he finally broke and started talking. As it turns out. what he was saying wasn't true, but the scouts were willing to use it as a lead."
Remembers Baughman: "It had all the feeling of an eventual massacre. I was afraid that I might see entire villages murdered."
The military confiscates most of Baughman's film. But he smuggles out three rolls. The pictures are published. The photographer is forced to leave Africa. Three years later, free elections are held in Rhodesia. Robert Mugabe becomes the first prime minister of the new, black majority-led country. Zimbabwe.
Winner in Spot Photography
Money-borrower's Revenge
1978 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, John H. Blair, United Press International
On Feb. 8, 1977, Anthony Kiritsis storms into Meridien Mortgage in Indianapolis. He wires a shotgun to Meridien president Richard Hall, marches Hall out of the building and commandeers a police car.
The story began months before when Meridien lent Kiritsis money to build a shopping center. The loan is due and Kiritsis cannot pay. He claims the money-lenders discouraged investors so that Meridien could foreclose on the property.
Now Kiritsis and Hall are holed up in the money-borrower's apartment. United Press International photographer John Blair is outside. "The place looked like an armed camp.'' Blair recalls. "State police, local police, sheriffs, every kind of law enforcement." Blair settles in with the rest of the UPI team and waits.
After three days of negotiation. Kiritsis finally agrees to release Hall. Blair is in the lobby, cameras ready. "Kiritsis walks him over still tied to the shotgun, lie says I'm a national hero and don't you forget it.'" As Kiritsis rants to the crowd, the photographer gets his pictures. "I had a good position and phenomenal angles. I had three cameras and I used all three."
Kiritsis releases Hall. Blair's photograph is sent out with others over the wire. Months later, one picture wins the Pulitzer — But it is credited to anotherUPI photographer. "I had strong feelings it was my photograph," says Blair. A careful examination of the negatives determines that John
Blair took the photograph that won the Pulitzer Prize.
1979
Winner in Feature Photography: Staff photographers, Boston Herald American, for coverage of the blizzard of 1978.
Winner in Spot Photography: Thomas J. Kelly III, Pottstown Mercury (Pennsylvania), for a series called "Tragedy on Sanatoga Road."
Winner in Feature Photography
Blizzard Rams New England
1979 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Staff Photographers of Boston Herald American
The lighthouse is 114 feet high, which means that foam is spraying 100 feet into the air, propelled upward by a raging sea that sinks ships and floods towns up and down the coast.
It is Feb. 8, 1978. A blizzard has rammed New England, shutting down roads, businesses and schools. Snow buries everything. Nothing moves. Kevin Cole, chief photographer at The Boston Herald American, is stuck in Plymouth, Mass. "The snow was over the house. I've never seen anything like it." Determined to cover the storm, Cole heads for the Hyannis airport. "I found this place called Discover Flying School. The wind was blowing. The pilot said 'You're crazy, nobody's going up.'"
Before long, they are airborne. "It was this little, tiny plane. We took off. The whole coastline was gone, houses in the water, houses floating, waves crashing inside them. About two miles out, I saw Minot Light."
In the raging wind, they circle the lighthouse. The pilot tells Cole, "We can't stay out here any longer.' Just as he started to turn, I saw a huge wave. That's when I got that shot, and that's the same time I threw up."
Other Herald American photographers fan out around the region, photographing the blizzard's destruction: Villages buried in freezing flood waters, commuters trapped in snow-covered cars. The newspaper publishes a special section, which chronicles the worst New England storm in 200 years—54 dead, 10,000 homeless and evacuated.
Winner in Spot Photography
Tragedy on Sanatoga Road
1978 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography,Thomas J. Kelly III, Pottstown Mercury (Pennsylvania)
On a spring day in 1978, Kelly responded to a call on his scanner that a man had taken his family hostage. Within minutes, he was on the scene, arriving to find that the police had surrounded a house where Richard Greist was holding hostage his pregnant wife and daughter, Beth Ann. Kelly instinctively began to document the events unfolding before him. He crept as close to the house as police would allow. The tension mounted.
The front door to the house opened and out came the young girl, begging the police to not hurt her father. She was bloodied, with multiple knife wounds. Chief Detective Douglas Weaver rushed in and grabbed the young girl, quickly escorting her to safety. Kelly, although a professional, had been unable to bring himself to photograph the young girl until her face was hidden from his direct view.
Concerned about the safety of others inside, the police were left with no choice but to storm the house. They captured Greist, but were too late to save the wife and unborn child. The terror was not over. Somehow, Greist freed himself and was just feet from Kelly, whose camera hung from his neck. Kelly does not remember taking the photographs of the charging murderer before Greist was again subdued. The chilling events ran across the Pottstown newspaper the next day. Kelly won a Pulitzer Prize for his work in covering the tragic events.
1980
Winner in Feature Photography: Erwin H. Hagler, Dallas Times Herald, for a series on the Western cowboy.
Winner in Spot Photography: Unnamed photographer, United Press International, for "Firing Squad in Iran."
Winner in Feature Photography
1980 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Erwin H. Hagler, Dallas Times Herald
Erwin H. Hagler graduated from the University of Texas at Austin with a bachelor's degree in architecture in 1971.
Hagler joined the Waco Texas Tribune photography staff after graduating from college. From 1972-1974, he was a photographer for the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, in his hometown of Fort Worth. He then went to work for the Dallas Times Herald from 1974 to its closing in 1988.
In addition to the Pulitzer Prize, Hagler also was honored by the National Press Photographer's Association as regional photographer of the year in 1972 and 1974.
He is currently a free-lance photographer in Dallas.
Winner in Spot Photography
Firing Squad in Iran
1980 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Jahangir Razmi of Ettela'at, Iran
Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini's Islamic Revolution steamrolls over Iran, imposing his Shiite Muslim beliefs on the entire country and destroying "corrupt Western influences." The country's 4 million Sunni Muslim Kurds reject Khomeni's rule-and his religion-and demand independence. Khomeni sends in his Revolutionary Guards, who slaughter thousands of Kurds, dispensing "justice" in mock trials.
On Aug. 27, in Sanandaj. Nine Kurdiah rebels and two former police officers of the disposed Shah of Iran are tried and sentenced to death. Their execution by firing squad is brutal and quick, documented in startling detail by a photographer from Ettdn'at an Iranian newspaper. To protect the photographer's life, his photo ran without credit in Ettela'at. A UPI staffer in Iran acquired the picture from the newspaper, and it was transmitted worldwide.
Explained the UPI staffer: "The photographer later related he was at risk of being shot himself, and smuggled the film in his trouser pocket. Those in the bureau often sat gazing at the picture, and contemplated the numbing transition from life to death that it depicts."
The Pulitzer Prize was awarded to "an unnamed photographer," which is how it stayed until 2006 when The Wall Siren Journal conclusively identified the photographer as Jahangir Razmi, who now runs a photo studio in Tehran. "Theres no more reason to hide." Razmi told the Journal
The Pulitzer Prize has been given only once to an anonymous winner. It was the 1980 Spot News Photography prize, awarded to "an unnamed photographer."
Jahangir Razmi was working for the Iranian newspaper, Ettela'at when he got permission to photograph the execution of 11 Kurdish men sentenced to death by the new theocracy in Iran. It was August 27, 1979 in Kurdistan. Razmi shot his Nikon freely as the blindfolded men were led to a dusty field and lined up before their executioners. He stood behind the rifleman on the right end, and when the command came to fire, he captured the split-second of men being struck alongside men waiting to be hit.
The editor of his newspaper feared Razmi would be in danger, so ran his photo with no credit line. The UPI bureau chief in Tehran transmitted it to the world with no name. After it appeared around the world, UPI's managing editor entered it for the Pulitzer Prize, explaining, "Because of the present unrest in Iran, the name of the photographer cannot be revealed at this time."
For 26 years, Razmi kept a contact sheet of 27 of the 70 frames he shot that day, and eight prints. He did not come forward even when others claimed credit for his picture. Only when Josh Prager found him, only after an evening's discussion with his family did Razmi decide to let the world learn who took that powerful photograph.
Two people here today were profoundly interested in Razmi's identity. Monir Nahid is the mother of two young men executed that day. Roya Nahid is their sister. We thank both of you for joining us from Los Angeles.
Sig Gissler has found the statement of the Spot News Photography jury to the Pulitzer Board in 1980. This is what the jury said: "Anonymous' photograph of the Iranian firing squad was clearly the most outstanding submission this year, and is probably the single most important photograph of 1979. It is not only a picture of enduring and memorable quality but also has the power to shape the viewer's feeling about a compelling international crisis. The photograph reads quickly; there is no doubt in the viewer's mind what is going on."
Due to complicated arrangements accomplished by Sig, Jahangir Razmi is here today, with his wife, Parvin. Jahangir Razmi, please come forward.
Razmi will receive the Pulitzer Prize certificate and $10,000--the amount that comes with the 2007 prize.
1981
Winner in Feature Photography: Taro M. Yamasaki, Detroit Free Press, for photos of Jackson State Prison in Michigan.
Winner in Spot Photography: Larry C. Price, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, for photos from Liberia.
Winner in Feature Photography
1981 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Taro M. Yamasaki, Detroit Free Press
Winner in Spot Photography
1981 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Larry C. Price, Fort Worth Star-Telegram
1982
Winner in Feature Photography: John H. White, Chicago Sun-Times, for consistently excellent work on a variety of subjects.
Winner in Spot Photography: Ron Edmonds, Associated Press, for his coverage of the Reagan assassination attempt.
Winner in Feature Photography
Life in Chicago
1982 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, John White, Chicago Sun-Times
For more than 30 years, John White has been photographing Chicago. "I live in the city, I breathe the city, the city is everything. There's the lakefront, there are the parks, I can see as good a sunrise in the city as anywhere in the world.
As a photographer for the Chicago Sun-Times, White covers his share of murders, political rallies, robberies and fires. But what he loves most are uplifting pictures: young dancers rehearsing at a new high school for the performing arts or children running joyfully through Cabrini Green, Chicago's most notorious housing project. "I don't really take pictures, I capture and share life. Moments come when pictures take themselves."
Whites prize-winning portfolio reflects a year in the life of the city and his work. "The purpose was to share slices of life from all walks of life; to be the psalm of the life of people. The photographs were from news situations, but not hard news. To me there is a wholeness that these images, these moments, give life. Most people get a steady diet of the hard news, the pain. I like to think these give the benefit of the joy and peace that life has also."
Winner in Spot Photography
Assassination Attempt on President Reagan
1982 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Ron Edmonds, Associated Press
On March 30, 1981, AP photographer Ron Edmonds waited for President Ronald Reagan outside the Washington Hilton Hotel. John Hinckley Jr. joined the crowd. Both men intended to shoot the president. One held a camera; the other, a gun.
Reagan appeared and started to wave. "I put my finger on the button," Edmonds said. "The shots rang out. Through my lens I saw him grimace."
Hinckley fired six pistol shots at the president. Secret Service agents shoved Reagan into his limo. Edmonds saw the wounded: press secretary Jim Brady, Secret Service agent Timothy McCarthy, police officer Thomas Delahanty. "When you're in those situations, it seems like an eternity because there is a lot going on," the photographer said. "It was awful. Just awful. I have always believed in keeping my guard up. You never know what is going to happen until it does. Fortunately, I pushed all the right buttons."
1983
Winner in Spot Photography: Bill Foley, Associated Press, for his moving series of pictures of victims and survivors of the massacre in the Sabra Camp in Beirut.
Winner in Feature Photography
Winner in Spot Photography
Angry Scene at Sabra
1983 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Bill Foley, Associated Press
In 1982, Israel invades Lebanon, determined to drive out the Palestine Liberation Organization and help establish a government sympathetic to Israel. But on Sept. 14, 1982, Christian president-elect Bashir Gemayel is assassinated.
Associated Press photographer Bill Foley heads for the Palestinian refugee camp at Sabra, which is run by the Christian militia. "There were guys with guns at the gates — Christian militia men who said, “Take a hike if you
don't want to get your head blown off.' I went back on Friday; the men were still there. There going on inside. There was shooting."
On Saturday, Foley returns again, to find the guards gone and the gates open. "It's always very noisy” says Foley, "kids, cows, animals." But that day we were 50 yards into the camp and you could hear your heart beat; nothing was moving."
It's not long before Foley realizes why: The streets are piled with bodies. "You'd see it was a pile people not a pile of garbage. You'd see people having dinner; they had been shot at the table. Women with their hands tied behind their backs, throats cut."
For three days the Christian militia had sealed off the camp and massacred those inside, killing hundreds. "They blamed the Palestinians for killing Gemayel, even though it could have been the Syrians; it have been the Israelis," says Foley. "They blamed the Palestinians; someone had to pay." One of Foley's photographs shows an angry Palestinian woman brandishing helmets she believes were worn by the killers.
1984
Winner in Feature Photography: Anthony Suau, The Denver Post, "for a series of photographs which depict the tragic effects of starvation in Ethiopia and for a single photograph of a woman at her husband's gravesite on Memorial Day."
Winner in Spot Photography: Stan Grossfeld, The Boston Globe for his series of unusual photographs which reveal the effects of war on the people of Lebanon.
Winner in Feature Photography
[Starvation in Ethiopia]
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[A woman at her husband's grave-site on Memorial Day]
1984 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Anthony Suau, The Denver Post
Winner in Spot Photography
1985
Winner in Feature Photography: Stan Grossfeld, The Boston Globe, for his series of photographs of the famine in Ethiopia and for his pictures of illegal aliens on the Mexican border.
Larry C. Price, The Philadelphia Inquirer, for his series of photographs from Angola and El Salvador depicting their war-torn inhabitants.
Winner in Spot Photography: Photography Staff The Register, Santa Ana, CA for their exceptional coverage of the Olympic games.
Winner in Feature Photography
Ethiopean Famine
1985 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Stan Grossfeld, The Boston Globe
"We snuck in on a food convoy. The convoy would travel at night and during the day they'd cover it up because Ethiopian MiGs would blow it up if they saw it."
It is 1984 when Stan Grossfeld and Boston Globe reporter Colin Nickerson discover the harsh reality of famine and politics in Ethiopia. The country's drought is in its fourth year. The crop has failed. The livestock are dead. Hundreds of thousands of people abandon their farms and villages and set out, looking for food.
There is little to be found. Some 130,000 tons of food from the United States have been held up by the Ethiopian government, which is determined to starve the rebel-held countryside into submission. Starve the people do — half a million Ethiopians, many of them children so hungry their bodies literally consume themselves. I’ll never forget the sounds of kids dying of starvation. They sound like cats wailing." For Grossfeld, the experience is overwhelming: "You try to be a technician and look through the viewfinder; sometimes the viewfinder fills up with tears.”
At a feeding station in the Tigray Province, Grossfeld photographs a child licking a flour sack. "I remember that kid," says Grossfeld. "He might have survived. He was smart enough to lick the sack." But for others, there is no hope. Grossfeld photographs this starving mother and child waiting in line for food in Wad Sharafin Camp. Hours later, the child is dead.
Winner in Spot Photography
Olympics in Los Angeles
[Anti-busing demonstration at City Hall in Boston, April 6, 1976, showing a protesters using the American flag as a lance. Forman took this while working for theBoston Herald American.]
1985 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, The Orange County (Calif.) Register Staff, The Orange County Register
At the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, athletes from China compete for the first time since 1952. Women from around the globe run their first Olympic marathons. And three photographers from The Orange County Register—Rick Rickman, Hal Stoelzle and Brian Smith — try to outdo news organizations that have 10 times their resources.
“The L.A. Times had 40 credentials and we had three," Rickman remembers. "It was a daunting task. You realize you're so outnumbered and so outgunned... it takes over and it effects everything you do. You drive yourself."
Realizing they can't go head-to-head with their competitors, the Register photographers set a different goal. "We were looking to create a striking shot," says Smith. "We wanted someone to pick up the paper and see something they hadn't seen on TV the night before. We definitely did not play it safe. Any time I could get out of the box for still photographers, I did."
Each photographer shoots three or four events a day. On Aug. 12, one of Hal Stoelzle's assignments is mens freestyle swimming. "I had arrived at about 5:30 a.m. to secure a spot and the finals didn't begin until late afternoon. The still photo positions... were located under the spectators' bleachers. The heat under the bleachers was oppressive, hotter than 100 degrees. But when Rowdy Gaines was greeted by his teammates in front of the American flag after winning a gold medal in the mens 100-meter freestyle race, I knew the wait had been worth it."
1986
Winner in Spot Photography: Carol Guzy and Michel duCille, The Miami Herald for their photographs of the devastation caused by the eruption of the Nevado del Ruiz volcano in Colombia.
Winner in Feature Photography
Philadelphia's Homeless
1986 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Tom Gralish, The Philadelphia Enquirer
“I like any kind of food. Whatever’s there, I buy it. Hot dog one day, the next Chinese food, roast beef sandwich.” — Walter, Philadelphia, homeless
In the winter of 1985, Philadelphia Inquirer photographer Tom Gralish steps out or his life and into the lives of the city’s street people. "I didn't know much about these guys. So I decided to show what their day is like. I wanted it to be straightforward 'doc photography.’ Go out and sec what you can find."
Gralish walks the streets with his camera. "I hooked up with one little group. It was like a community — enough vendors to be nice to them, enough steam grates, a liquor store nearby, a hospital, lots of commuters to panhandle — everything they needed."
Some men live on fire escapes; others in alleys. Walter lives on a sidewalk heating grate. "Walter is one of the guys who is hard to reach because he talks to himself and rants to people on the street. Everyone knows him; people who live and work in the neighborhood give him change. He was one of those guys who was hot and cold to me."
Eventually, Walter allows Gralish to photograph him- "People like it when you pay attention to them. These guys had disdain for society and the rules: that's why they objected to the shelters. They saw themselves as the last free men."
Winner in Spot Photography
1986 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Carol Guzy and Michel duCille, The Miami Herald
1987
Winner in Feature Photography: David C. Peterson, Des Moines Register, "for his photographs depicting the shattered dreams of American farmers."
Winner in Spot Photography: Kim Komenich, San Francisco Examiner, for his photographic coverage of the fall of Ferdinand Marcos.
Winner in Feature Photography
1987 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, David C. Peterson, Des Moines Register
Winner in Spot Photography
1987 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Kim Komenich, San Francisco Examiner
1988
Winner in Feature Photography: Michel duCille, The Miami Herald, for photographs portraying the decay and subsequent rehabilitation of a housing project overrun by the drug crack.
Winner in Spot Photography: Scott Shaw Odessa, (TX) American, for his photograph of the child Jessica McClure being rescued from the well into which she had fallen.
Winner in Feature Photography
1988 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Michel duCille, The Miami Herald
Winner in Spot Photography
1988 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Scott Shaw Odessa, (TX) American
1989
Winner in Feature Photography: Manny Crisostomo, Detroit Free Press, "for his series of photographs depicting student life at Southwestern High School in Detroit."
Winner in Spot Photography: Ron Olshwanger, free-lance photographer for a picture published in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch of a firefighter giving mouth-to-mouth resuscitation to a child pulled from a burning building.
Winner in Feature Photography
1989 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Manny Crisostomo, Detroit Free Press
Winner in Spot Photography
1989 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Ron Olshwanger, free-lance photographer
1990
Winner in Feature Photography: David C. Turnley, Detroit Free Press, "for photographs of the political uprisings in China and Eastern Europe."
Winner in Spot Photography: Photo Staff The Tribune, Oakland, CA for photographs of devastation caused by the Bay Area earthquake of October 17, 1989.
Winner in Feature Photography
1990 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, David C. Turnley, Detroit Free Press
Winner in Spot Photography
1990 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Photo Staff The Tribune, Oakland, CA
1991
Winner in Feature Photography: William Snyder, The Dallas Morning News, "for his photographs of ill and orphaned children living in subhuman conditions in Romania."
Winner in Spot Photography: Greg Marinovich, Associated Press, for a series of photographs of supporters of South Africa's African National Congress brutally murdering a man they believed to be a Zulu spy.
Winner in Feature Photography
1991 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, William Snyder, The Dallas Morning News
Winner in Spot Photography
Human Torch
1991 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Greg Marinovich, Associated Press
Soweto. South Africa: Its not yet dawn when Greg Marinovich and Associated Press reporter Tom Cohen stumble onto a gunfight between supporters of the African National Congress and the predominantly Zulu Inkatha Freedom Party. A train pulls into a nearby station; a Zulu man, Lindsaye Tshabalala, disembarks. "He could have been returning from a night shift or making an early start to visit friends," says Marinovich.
ANC youths seize Tshabalaia. "They began to stone and stab him. I watched in shock as he fell to the ground." The assault intensifies; finally, "a man hauled out a massive, shiny Howie knife and stabbed hard into the victim's chest. My heart was racing and I had difficulty taking deep enough breaths. I called out 'Who is he?’ ‘What’s he done?’ A voice from the crowd replied. "He's an Inkatha spy."
When Marinovich tries to argue, the attackers insist he stop taking pictures. Marinovich says, "I'll stop raking pictures when you stop killing him." The brutal attack continues. "For those crucial minutes, it was as if I lost my grasp of what was going on. The pictures I kept mechanically snapping off would later substitute for the events my memory could not recall."
The Zulu now lies motionless on the ground. Marinovich is momentarily drawn away by an attack on another man. "Suddenly, I heard a hollow 'whoof’ and women began to ululate in a celebration of victory. Dread filled me. The man I thought dead was running across the field below us. His body enveloped in flames. A bare-chested, barefoot man ran into view and swung a machete into the mans blazing skull as a frantic young boy fled from this vision of hell."
Marinovich makes it back to his car. "I pulled over and. closing my eyes, began to beat the steering wheel with my fists. I could finally scream."
1992
Winner in Spot Photography: Staff Associated Press, photographs of the attempted coup in Russia and the subsequent collapse of the Communist regime.
Winner in Feature Photography
1992 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, John Kaplan, Block Newspapers
Winner in Spot Photography
1993
Winner in Feature Photography: Staff of Associated Press, for its portfolio of images drawn from the 1992 presidential campaign.
Winner in Spot Photography: Ken Geiger and William Snyder, The Dallas Morning News, for their dramatic photographs of the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona.
Winner in Feature Photography
1992 presidential campaign
1993 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Associated Press
Associated Press photography staff won the Pulitzer Prize for its coverage of the 1992 presidential campaign. The photography team consisted of J. Scott Applewhite, Marcy Nighswander, Richard Drew, Amy Sancetta, Greg Gibson, Stephan Savoia, David Longstretch, Reed Saxon, Doug Mills, and Lynne Sladky.
Winner in Spot Photography
Olympics in Barcelona
1993 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Ken Geiger and William Snyder, The Dallas Morning News
In July 1992, 600 photojournalists arrive in Barcelona, Spain, to cover the summer Olympic Games. Some news organizations field dozens of photographers. The Dallas Morning News sends two: William Snyder and Ken Geiger.
For Geiger, photographing the Olympics is "one of the hardest things I've ever had to do. Its a marathon for a journalist." Snyder agrees: "Our goal was to be the lead photo on Page One every day.... I remember what it felt like to score a goal or win a race. That's what I was after, to capture what it felt like and bring it home to the people who look at our pictures. " Geigers finds his first event, mens soccer, "kind of intimidating.... When I edited the film, I was real pleased. I thought "Man I hope I can keep up this pace.'"
The photographers divvy up the events. Snyder gets basketball and diving. "We did what we wanted to do," he says. “We went out there with the idea that not only would we get the moments, but we would also try to shoot things differently."
Geiger covers track and field. He has just finished photographing the U.S. women's team winning the 4 x 100 relay when he notices the Nigerian women watching the scoreboard. "When it became official that they had third place (a Bronze medal), they broke into celebration. I had to change cameras to one with a shorter lens. Then I took the photo."River Rescue in Downtown Des Moines
1994
Winner in Feature Photography: Kevin Carter, a free-lance photographer, "for a picture 'Sudane Famine', first published in The New York Times of a starving Sudanese girl who collapsed on her way to a feeding center while a vulture waited nearby."
Winner in Spot Photography: Paul Watson, Toronto Star, 'Dead U.S. Soldier in Mogadishu',
Winner in Feature Photography
Sudane Famine
1994 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Kevin Carter, The New York Times
By February 1993, South African photojournalist Kevin Carter has spent a decade photographing the political strife roiling his homeland. He describes lying in the middle of a gunfight. "wondering about which millisecond next I was going to die, about putting something on film they could use as my last picture."
Needing a change, Carter travels to the Sudan to cover the relentless East African famine. At a feeding station at Ayod. He finds people so weakened by hunger that they are dying at the rate of 20 an hour. As he photographs their hollow eyes and bloated bellies, Carter hears a soft whimpering in the bush. Investigating, he finds a tiny girl trying to make her way to the feeding center. Carter crouches, readying his camera. Suddenly, a vulture lands nearby. Carter waits. The vulture waits. Carter takes his photographs, then chases the bird away. Afterward, he sits under a tree and cries.
The photograph runs in newspapers worldwide. Carter receives outraged letters and angry midnight phone calls. Everyone wants to know: Why didn't he pick up the child?
Journalists in the Sudan had been told not to touch famine victims, because of the risk of transmitting disease. This is no comfort to Carter, who tells a friend. "I'm really, really sorry I didn’t pick the child up." The controversy and other personal problems overwhelm him. On July 26, 1994, police find Kevin Carter dead, an apparent suicide. He is 33 years old.
Winner in Spot Photography
Dead U.S. Soldier in Mogadishu
1994 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Paul Watson, Toronto Star
In the early 1990s, clan warfare ravages Somalia. Famine spreads. A United States-led multinational force restores supply lines, but its presence creates new tensions. In July 1993, four journalists are beaten to death by an angry mob. Most Western journalists flee. Paul Watson of The Toronto Star stays behind. The press corps is down to just a few journalists, says Watson, when Somali gunmen shoot down an American helicopter in late September. "Witnesses said people dragged part of an American corpse away in a sack to put it on display," says the photographer. "The Pentagon flatly denied that American body parts were being paraded through the streets of Mogadishu."
On Oct. 3, a U.S. Army unit engages in a fierce fight with Somali warlord Mohammed Farah Aidid. In the aftermath, Watson hears that an American serviceman has been captured. Out on the street, he discovers a mob dragging the body of a U.S. soldier. "I approached with a bodyguard on either side. The mob parted long enough for me to shoot about seven frames. My bodyguard forced me back into the car because he had heard threats from the crowd."
Watson’s first photographs show the filthy body of the dead soldier, clad only in underwear, partially exposing his genitalia. "1 jumped out to get just a few frames more. They were all half-body pictures. I didn't want to give any editor an excuse not to use the picture."
Hundreds of newspapers publish the photograph. The public reacts with horror. In March 1994, the United States withdraws entire military force from Somalia.
1995
Winner in Feature Photography: Staff of Associated Press, "for its portfolio of photographs chronicling the horror and devastation in Rwanda."
Winner in Spot Photography: 'Crisis in Haiti', Spot News Photography, Carol Guzy, Washington Post.
Winner in Feature Photography
Portfolio of photographs chronicling the horror and devastation in Rwanda
1995 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Staff of Associated Press
Winner in Spot Photography
Crisis in Haiti
1995 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Carol Guzy, Washington Post
"Some say I became obsessed, but I’d rather call it a mission." Carol Guzy has covered Haiti since the early 1980s, returning on her own when she cannot convince an editor to send her. "I felt like I had to make people see what was going on there." says Guzy. "The country is so small no one in the U.S. is aware of it."
On Dec. 16, 1990, Jean-Bertrand Aristide wins Haiti's first free presidential elections. Less than a year later, he is deposed and sent into exile. The United States imposes a trade embargo; thousands of Haitians flee. "I had gotten to the point that even I had lost all hope," says Guzy. "I thought nothing would get better. The military government was entrenched." In September 1994, U.S. troops land in Haiti to help return Aristide to power. "There were still a lot of problems," says Guzy. "But for the first time in a long time I saw hope and even jubilation in people's eyes."
In Port-au-Prince, Guzy photographs a "very- joyous democracy march." Then someone throws a grenade into the crowd. "People were killed and wounded. There was shooting, nobody could figure out where it was coming from. I hit the ground with everybody else. I turned and saw the (U.S.) soldier. The guy- on the ground with his arm raised up, the crowd thought he had thrown the grenade and they were trying to tear him apart. The U.S. troops were trying to protect him."
1996
Winner in Feature Photography: Stephanie Welsh, "a free-lancer, for her shocking sequence of photos, published by Newhouse News Service, of a female genital cutting rite inKenya."
Winner in Spot Photography: Charles Porter IV, a freelancer for his haunting photographs, taken after the Oklahoma City bombing and distributed by the Associated Press, showing a one-year-old victim handed to and then cradled by a local fireman.
Winner in Feature Photography
1996 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Stephanie Welsh, Newhouse News Service
Winner in Spot Photography
Oklahoma City Bombing
1996 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Charles Porter IV, Associated Press
On April 19, 1995, Charles Porter is working in the loan department at Liberty Bank in downtown Oklahoma City. Suddenly "there was just a huge, huge explosion ... a loud boom, like a sonic boom. The whole building shook, the windows were bowing back and forth. We looked out the window and saw debris fluttering up in the air, this light-brown cloud rising up."
Thinking someone is demolishing a building downtown, Porter, an aspiring photojournalism hurries to his car, grabs his camera and runs toward the explosion. "There is glass all over the street. I see people lying on the ground. A guy walks by without his shirt and blood is streaming from his head."
When Porter reaches the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building, "its like they shaved off the front of the building and then they took an ice cream scoop and scooped right down the center. You could see through the building."
Porter photographs a church with its stained-glass windows blown out, rescue workers aiding the wounded. Then "I see something run toward the left corner of my eye. I turn with my camera: Its a policeman carrying something. I snap the frame just as the policeman hands it to a fireman. The fireman turns, and he's holding this infant. He just holds it there for a couple of seconds. I take one shot."
The explosion injures more than 500 people. It kills 168, including the child in Porter's picture, Baylee Almon, just 1 year old.
1997
Winner in Feature Photography: Alexander Zemlianichenko, Associated Press, "for his photograph of Russian President Boris Yeltsin dancing at a rock concert during his campaign for re-election. This was originally nominated in the Spot News Photography section, but was moved by the board to Feature Photography."
Winner in Spot Photography: Annie Wells, The Press Democrat, Santa Rosa, CA for her dramatic photograph of a local firefighter rescuing a teenager from raging flood waters.
Winner in Feature Photography
1997 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Alexander Zemlianichenko, Associated Press
Winner in Spot Photography
1997 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography,Annie Wells, The Press Democrat
1998
Winner in Feature Photography: Clarence Williams, Los Angeles Times, "for his powerful images documenting the plight of young children with parents addicted to alcohol and drugs."
Winner in Spot Photography: Martha Rial, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, for her life-affirming portraits of survivors of the conflicts in Rwanda and Burundi.
Winner in Feature Photography
1998 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Clarence Williams, Los Angeles Times
Winner in Spot Photography
Trek of Tears: An African Journey
1998 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Martha Rial, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
The line of refugees reaches to the horizon, victims of the centuries-old warfare between Africa's Hutu and Tutsi tribes. Most are women and children. Many are hungry.
"The people would flee together as a village," says Martha Rial. "Many children were separated from their families." It is January 1997, and Rial is in Tanzania, photographing the refugees for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. The story has a personal angle for Rial: Her sister. Amy, is a nurse with the International Rescue Committee in Tanzania.
"I did photographs of her because of the Pittsburgh connection; I worked it into the whole scope of the project." Rials pictures show her sister caring for malnourished children, refugees lining up for food, a Hutu woman who was raped and stabbed by Tutsi soldiers, a Tutsi woman who adopts an orphaned Hutu child.
Most of what she finds reeks of displacement and despair. "The stream (of refugees) you see here had been walking almost 24 hours. The previous evening they heard word that the Tanzanian government was going to force them to leave. They were trying to flee, to go deeper into the bush. They were forced back by the troops into Rwanda. The group is led by a handful of militia guys. Men who are the leaders in the communities. They may or may not be wanted for genocide."
1999
Winner in Feature Photography: Staff of Associated Press, "for its striking collection of photographs of the key players and events stemming from President Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky and the ensuing impeachment hearings."
Winner in Spot Photography: Photo Staff Associated Press, for its portfolio of images following the embassy bombings in Kenya and Tanzania that illustrates both the horror and the humanity triggered by the event.
Winner in Feature Photography
1999 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Staff of Associated Press
Winner in Spot Photography
1999 Pulitzer Prize, Spot News Photography, Photo Staff Associated Press
2000
Winner in Feature Photography: Carol Guzy, Michael Williamson and Lucian Perkins, Washington Post, "for their intimate and poignant images depicting the plight of the Kosovo refugees."
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: Denver Rocky Mountain News Photo Staff, for its powerful collection of emotional images taken after the student shootings at Columbine High School.
Winner in Feature Photography
Fleeing Kosovo
2000 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Carol Guzy, Lucian Perkins and Michael Williamson
By the thousands, they come. Ragged, weary, fleeing the Serbs. A tidal wave of ethnic Albanians trying to cross from Kosovo into Macedonia and Albania. But there are no welcome signs.
Aid workers set up primitive tent camps. There is little food, water and few medical supplies. The refugees, mostly women, children and the elderly, wait in limbo.
Washington Post photographers Carol Guzy, Michael Williamson and Lucian Perkins spend two months in the camps. Interpreters help them understand the plight and despair. "No still picture," Guzy says, "could possibly convey their tears and pain or the hell from which they had come." Yet the photographers capture it as best they can.
Guzy crosses the border at Morina with refugees headed for a transit camp in Kukcs, Albania. Stripped of their possessions, they wait to get in. On either side of the camp fence, members of the Shala family unite. They pass 2-year-old Akim Shala through the fence. Guzys camera captures the baby sliding through the barbed wire into the hands of his loving grandparents.
Perkins and an estimated 70,000 refugees are near Macedonia in a no mans land called Blace. There is no shelter. Disease is spreading. Families try to get out. But border guards allow only a trickle of refugees to leave. Cameras swinging from his neck, Perkins hides behind a truck and slips past camp guards. He photographs sorrow and desperation.
Williamson is in Velika Krusa, Kosovo, covering the havoc wrought by Serbs. In a burned-out house, Qamil Duraku sits on a bucket, looks up and says, "You’re here. You finally came." The man thinks the photographer is a war crimes investigator there to document the deaths of his cousins. In each hand he holds pieces of his relatives, body parts the Serbs had torched. He cries, "Why did they do this? Why?" Williamson tries to comfort Duraku. He can’t. He takes his photograph.
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in
Breaking News Photography
Grief overcomes Columbine High School students Jessica Holliday, left, and Diwana Perez moments after they fled the school during a violent rampage by two fellow students 20th April, 2000.
2000 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Denver Rocky Mountain News Photo Staff
2001
Winner in Feature Photography: Matt Rainey, Star-Ledger (New Jersey), "for his emotional photographs that illustrate the care and recovery of two students critically burned in a dormitory fire at Seton Hall University."
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Feature Photography
2001 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Matt Rainey, Star-Ledger (New Jersey)
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
Elián
2001 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Alan Diaz, Associated Press
It's dawn in Miami's Little Havana. Photographers and reporters doze on lawn chairs. Demonstrators mill about after in all-night vigil. Inside the house, a family lawyer negotiates by phone with U.S. Attorney General Janet Reno. On the sofa sleeps 6-year-old Elian Gonzalez.
Associated Press photographer Alan Diaz stands at the backyard fence. For five months from this spot. Diaz has covered the international custody war between the child's cousins in Miami and father in Cuba. Diaz has lived in Cuba and speaks Spanish. The relatives let him take pictures. But he must stay outside the fence. And he must never, ever speak to Elian.
At 5 a.m. on April 22. 2000, rumors swirl: a temporary accord may allow a visit with the boys lather. The rumors prove untrue. All at once Diaz hears heavy boots stampede the backyard. He grabs his camera, jumps the fence. A family friend lets him in the front door and locks it. Federal agents smash through the house. Diaz sees the relatives scream, mouths moving but bodies frozen.
"Where's the boy?" Diaz shouts. Someone shoves him into the bedroom. Donato Dalrymple, who plucked Elian from the sea, is trying to hide the boy. "What's happening?" Elian asks. "What's happening?" For the first time, Diaz speaks to Elian, tries to calm him down. Then agents kick open the door. One points a 9 mm submachine gun. Diaz takes the picture: a terrified child being seized by the federal government. The lightning move by federal agents takes just 154 seconds.
Even today, long after the court rulings have sent Elian back to Cuba with his father, one thing remains a mystery to photographer Diaz. He can’t figure out how he jumped the fence. "It may have been my pulsing adrenaline." he says. "But then again, I guess it was part of what I always do—I shoot pictures."
About the Photographer:
Early Days
Alan Diaz was born and raised in New York. He relocated to Cuba in 1964 to join his parents who had previously returned to their native country. Diaz went to school in Cuba and earned a teaching degree. Upon graduation he began teaching but took up a hobby which would soon change his life and his career path.
Back in the States
In 1978 Diaz returned to the states and settled in Miami, Florida. There he continued teaching English, but began working as a freelance photographer in his spare time. In 1994 Diaz was hired by the Associated Press as a freelance photographer. In 2000 after receiving the Pulitzer Prize for his Elian Gonzalez photo, AP hired him as a staff photographer.
After the Award
Diaz admits his life changed drastically after winning the Pulitzer. His freelance job with AP turned into a full time staff position, and he has been sought after for interviews by fellow journalists. Diaz admits that it was a great honor winning the award, but most photographers who do so have in the wake of witnessing some of the most devastating events. Whether it is a war shot or a natural disaster, the event stays with you forever. Diaz admits that even as the father of four he had never heard a cry of such desperation as the cry that came from Elian when the federal agents arrived, a cry he will never forget.
2002
Winner in Feature Photography: The New York Times staff, "for its photographs chronicling the pain and the perseverance of people enduring protracted conflict in Afghanistan and Pakistan."
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: Staff The New York Times, for its consistently outstanding photographic coverage of the terrorist attack on New York City and its aftermath.
Winner in Feature Photography
2002 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, The New York Times staff
Winner in Spot News Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
World Trade Center Attack
2002 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Steve Ludlum, New York Times
Sept. 11. 2001, dawns dear, a great day for a morning walk. At 8:30 a.m., as artist and freelance photographer Steve Ludlum strolls the Brooklyn waterfront, he sees black smoke pouring from the North Tower of the World Trade Center across the river. Sprinting, Ludlum runs home for his camera and finds a friend to drive him to the Manhattan Bridge to locate a good view of the World Trade Center.
Ludlum rests his zoom lens on a fence's iron railing. He adjusts his camera, unaware that United Airlines Flight 175 is headed straight for the South Tower. He doesn't see the plane hit, but a ball of fire appeared in his viewfinder. "Bomb." he thinks, releasing the shutter.
His regular photo lab is too busy. Reluctantly he opts for a one-hour drugstore service. Ninety anxious minutes later, he opens the envelope. The negative is sharp. His next stop is The New York Times.
Ludlum reacts emotionally to the disaster that killed so many that day. He says, "An artist has one shot at greatness and this was mine."
Note: The New York Times staff photographers were among the first to arrive at the World Trade Center disaster scene. Because communications were disrupted, the Times photo editors had no way of knowing if their photographers were alive. After risking their lives to record the destruction of the World Trade Center, they fought through blinding smoke and falling debris to deliver their film to the Times. Steve Ludlum’s photograph was submitted as part of the Times' portfolio.
2003
Winner in Feature Photography: Don Bartletti, Los Angeles Times, "for his memorable portrayal of how undocumented Central American youths, often facing deadly danger, travel north to the United States."
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: Photography Staff, Rocky Mountain News, for its powerful, imaginative coverage of Colorado's raging forest fires.
Winner in Feature Photography
2003 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Don Bartletti, Los Angeles Times
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
2003 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Photography Staff Rocky Mountain News
Firefighter Daniel Crawford catches his breath after battling the Hayman Fire near Deckers all day. The blaze, which ultimately consumed 137,000 acres and destroyed 132 homes, exploded to nearly 87,000 acres that day.
2004
Winner in Feature Photography: Carolyn Cole, Los Angeles Times, for her cohesive, behind-the-scenes look at the effects of civil war in Liberia, with special attention to innocent citizens caught in the conflict.
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: David Leeson and Cheryl Diaz Meyer, The Dallas Morning News, for their eloquent photographs depicting both the violence and poignancy of the war with Iraq.
Winner in Feature Photography
2004 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Carolyn Cole of Los Angeles Times
A government soldier defends a bridge in central Monrovia where a standoff between rebel and government forces held the city under siege. ( Carolyn Cole / Los Angeles Times )
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
2004 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, David Leeson and Cheryl Diaz Meyer The Dallas Morning News
With the sunlight obliterated by a late March sandstorm, red and orange skies created an eerie and ominous welcome to troops of the 3rd Infantry Division as they advanced on Al Kifl.
See the entire series here
2005
Winner in Feature Photography: Deanne Fitzmaurice, San Francisco Chronicle, "for her sensitive photo essay on an Oakland hospital's effort to mend an Iraqi boy nearly killed by an explosion."
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: Staff Associated Press for its stunning series of photographs of bloody yearlong combat inside Iraqi cities.
Winner in Feature Photography
2005 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Deanne Fitzmaurice, San Francisco Chronicle
Though usually upbeat, Saleh was sensitive about his appearance. One afternoon, when he saw other children staring at him, Saleh became angry and upset. Nurses sought to soothe him by taping a felt tip pen to this arm so he could draw pictures. Saleh drew an airplane dropping bombs.
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
2005 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Staff Associated Press
2006
Winner in Feature Photography: Todd Heisler, of Rocky Mountain News, "for his haunting, behind-the-scenes look at funerals for Colorado Marines who return from Iraq in caskets."
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: Staff, The Dallas Morning News, for its vivid photographs depicting the chaos and pain after Hurricane Katrina engulfed New Orleans.
Winner in Feature Photography
2006 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Todd Heisler, of Rocky Mountain News
Marine Major Steve Beck prepares for the final inspection of 2nd Lt. James J. Cathey's body, only days after notifying Cathey's wife of the Marine's death in Iraq. The knock at the door begins a ritual steeped in tradition more than two centuries old; a tradition based on the same tenet: "Never leave a Marine behind." When the wars began in Afghanistan and Iraq, Maj. Steve Beck expected to find himself overseas, in the heat of battle. He never thought he would be the one arranging funerals for his fallen comrades.
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
2006 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Staff The Dallas Morning News
See the entire series here
New Orleans, LA -- Dejon Fisher, 8, waited fearfully with Cavel Fisher Clay, 33, and Alexis Fisher, 14, in a hostile line for busses to the Houston Astrodome.
2007
Winner in Feature Photography: Renée C. Byer, The Sacramento Bee, "for her intimate portrayal of a single mother and her young son as he loses his battle with cancer."
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: Oded Balilty, Associated Press, for his powerful photograph of a lone Jewish woman defying Israeli security forces as they remove illegal settlers in the West Bank.
Winner in Feature Photography
2007 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Renée C. Byer of The Sacramento Bee
Winner in Spot Photography
2007 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Oded Balilty Associated Press
A lone Jewish settler challenges Israeli security officers during clashes that erupted as authorities cleared the West Bank settlement of Amona, east of the Palestinian town of Ramallah. Thousands of troops in riot gear and on horseback clashed with hundreds of stone-throwing Jewish settlers holed up in this illegal West Bank outpost after Israel's Supreme Court cleared the way of demolition of nine homes at the site. (February 1, 2006)
2008
Both awards carry a $10,000 honorarium as well as considerable prestige.
Winner in Spot Photography:
Breaking News Photography: Adrees Latifof Reuters, for his dramatic photograph of a Japanese videographer [Kenji Nagai —MJ], sprawled on the pavement, fatally wounded during a street demonstration in Myanmar.
Winner in Feature Photography
Remember Me
Remember Me
2008 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Preston Gannaway, Concord (N.H.)
Preston Gannaway got the Pulitzer Prize for her photo-essay "Remember Me."
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
A wounded Japanese photographer, Kenji Nagai, as he lay before a Burmese soldier in Yangon,Myanmar, as troops attacked protesters
This photograph that won him this honor is of “a wounded Japanese photographer, Kenji Nagai, as he lay before a Burmese soldier in Yangon,Myanmar, as troops attacked protesters.” Mr. Nagai later dies. The photograph was published by Reuters on September 28, 2007.
According to the Pulitzer Prize website, the category in which Adrees Latif has won is for “a distinguished example of breaking news photography in black and white or color, which may consist of a photograph or photographs, a sequence or an album, in print or online or both, Ten thousand dollars ($10,000).” His citation reads:
Awarded to Adrees Latif of Reuters for his dramatic photograph of a Japanese videographer, sprawled on the pavement, fatally wounded during a street demonstration in Myanmar.
The biography of Adrees Latif, also according to the Pulitzer Prize website, reads:
Born in Lahore, Pakistan on July 21, 1973, Adrees Latif lived in Saudi Arabia before immigrating with his family to Texas in 1980. Latif worked as a staff photographer for The Houston Post from 1993 to 1996 before joining Reuters. Latif graduated from the University of Houston in 1999 with a Bachelor of Arts in Journalism. Latif has worked for Reuters in Houston, Los Angeles before moving to Bangkok in 2003 where he covers news across Asia.
We at ATP are happy that at least we can spot talent – we have, in fact, been using one of his photographs as a front page splash image for a while (it is up now as the Front Page splash and on the left). Readers would remember, that earlier Ali Khurshid – another Pakistani photographer – had been honored by Time magazine; in that case too, we at ATP had featured his work well before Time did.
2009
Winner in Feature Photography: Damon Winter of The New York Times, "for his memorable array of pictures deftly capturing multiple facets of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign." - Damon Winter The New York Times
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: Patrick Farrell, Miami Herald, "After the Storm"
Winner in Feature Photography
2009 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Damon Winter, The New York Times
Awarded to Damon Winter of The New York Times for his memorable array of pictures deftly capturing multiple facets of Barack Obama’s presidential campaign.
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
After the Storm
2009 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Patrick Farrell, Miami Herald
Patrick Farrell of the 'The Miami Herald' received the Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, for his provocative, impeccably composed images of despair after Hurricane Ike and other lethal storms caused a humanitarian disaster in Haiti.
2010
Winner in Feature Photography: Craig F. Walker, The Denver Post, "for his intimate portrait of a teenager who joins the Army at the height of insurgent violence in Iraq, poignantly searching for meaning and manhood." Feature Photography Images
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: Mary Chind, The Des Moines Register for her photograph of the heart-stopping moment when a rescuer dangling in a makeshift harness tries to save a woman trapped in the foaming water beneath a dam.
Winner in Feature Photography
Portrait of a Teenager Who Joins the Army
2010 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Craig F. Walker, Denver Post
Ian Fisher cradles his injured elbow during his processing into the Army in Ft. Benning, Ga. On June 20, 2007. Though he later had a change of heart after speaking with a commander, he saw a possibility to escape his enlistment only two days in. From his first day in fatigues through his days driving a Humvee in Iraq, military life often didn’t mesh with his expectations. Sometimes the structure of the Army and the demands of training for war clashed with the freedom he shared with his outside friends.
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
2010 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Mary Child of Des Moines Register
River rescue in downtown Des Moines: A woman is pulled from near the Center Street dam by construction worker Jason Oglesbee on Tuesday. A man who was with the unidentified woman died in the Des Moines River. A rescue team from the Des Moines Fire Department tried several times to rescue the woman but could not get close enough to her.
Published July 1, 2009
2011
Winner in Feature Photography: Barbara Davidson, Los Angeles Times, "For her intimate story of innocent victims trapped in the city’s crossfire of deadly gang violence."
Winner in Spot Photography:
Winner in Breaking News Photography: Carol Guzy, Nikki Kahn and Ricky Carioti, The Washington Post, for their up-close portrait of grief and desperation after a catastrophic earthquake struck Haiti.
Winner in Feature Photography
2011 Pulitzer Prize, Feature Photography, Barbara Davidson, Los Angeles Times
Josue Hercules’ mother, Wendoly Andrade, says, ‘I do not know what will happen to my son’s life.’ Six months after the shooting, Josue’s father moved out, leaving his mother to balance Josue’s increased needs with those of her other four children. In this photo, from left, Josue, Katherine, Kevin, Kimberlin and Oscar share a one-bedroom apartment with their mother. (Barbara Davidson, Los Angeles Times – December 29, 2010)
The 95th annual Pulitzer Prizes in Journalism, Letters, Drama and Music, awarded on the recommendation of the Pulitzer Prize Board, were announced last week by Columbia University. More than 2,500 entries are submitted each year to the Pulitzer Prize competition and only 21 prizes are awarded.
The year-long process begins with the appointment of 102 distinguished jurors who serve on separate juries and make three recommendations in each of 21 categories. In twenty of these, each winner receives a certificate and a US$10,000 cash award. The winner in the public service category of the journalism competition is awarded a gold medal, which always goes to a newspaper, although an individual may be named in the citation.
For a distinguished example of feature photography in black and white or color, which may consist of a photograph or photographs, in print or online or both, Ten thousand dollars ($10,000). Awarded to Barbara Davidson of the Los Angeles Times for her intimate story of innocent victims trapped in the city’s crossfire of deadly gang violence.
Also nominated as finalists in this category were: Todd Heisler of The New York Times for his sensitive portrayal of a large Colombian clan carrying a genetic mutation that causes Alzheimer’s disease in early middle age, and Greg Kahn of The Naples Daily News for his pictures that show the mixed impact of the recession in Florida – loss of jobs and homes for some but profit for others.
“It’s just fantastically surreal,” Davidson said from the crowded Los Angeles Times newsroom, where reporters and editors greeted the news of The Times’ Pulitzers with cheers. The newspaper also was awarded a Pulitzer for public service for its reporting on the scandal in the city of Bell.
“I’m humbled by the honor,” Davidson said of her Pulitzer, “and hope that it will raise awareness of the issue of gang violence and it’s impact on innocent victims.”
Winner in Spot Photography
Winner in Breaking News Photography
2011 Pulitzer Prize, Breaking News Photography, Carol Guzy, Nikki Kahn and Ricky Carioti, The Washington Post
this is coo
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