photo mag

MARGARET
BOURKE-WHITE
47
(JUNE 14,1904 – AUGUST 27,1971)
Margaret Bourke-White was born in Bronx, New York in 1904 and attended
Clarence H. White School of Photography in 1921-1922. She graduated from
Cornell University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in 1927. Bourke-White left
behind a photographic study of the rural campus for the school’s newspaper
which included photos of her dormitory at Risely Hall. She moved to Cleveland,
Ohio where she started a commercial photography studio and began concentrating
on Architectural and industrial photography. Her success was due to her skills
with both people and her technique. Her work caught the attention of Henry
Luce who hired her in 1929 and sent her to the Soviet Union the next year. She
was the first foreign photographer to take photos of the Soviet Industry. She
photographed the Dust Bowl for Fortune in 1934 and in the fall of 1936, Henry
Luce offered Bourke-White a job as a staff photographer for his newly conceived
Life magazine. She was one of the first four photographers hired and her photograph
of Fort Peck Dam was reproduced on the first cover.
Throughout World War II, Margaret Bourke-White produced a number of photo
essays on the turmoil in Europe. She was the only Western photographer to witness
the German invasion of Moscow in 1941, she was the first woman to accompany Air
Corps crew on bombing missions in 1942, and she traveled with Patton’s army through
Germany in 1945 as it liberated several concentration camps. During the next twelve
years, she photographed major international events and stories, including Gandhi’s fight
for Indian independence, the unrest in South Africa, and the Korean War. Bourke-White
contracted Parkinson’s disease in 1953 and made her last photo essay for Life in 1957.