The Tumultuous Fifties: A View from the New York Times Photo Archives [Hardcover]

Douglas Dreishpoon (Author), Prof. Alan Trachtenberg (Author), Alan Trachtenberg (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 2001

The Cold War, Sputnik, Joseph McCarthy, Fidel Castro, the Rosenbergs, Marilyn Monroe, Rosa Parks, Father Knows Best and Rebel Without a Cause are just a few of the events, people, and cultural phenomena that marked the decade of the 1950s. This stunning book, a collection of two hundred large-scale duotone photographs of the 1950s culled from the New York Times photo archives, brings this watershed period to life and examines who and what was important and why. The photographs, which include both famous and lesser-known images, are arranged thematically, under the headings 'America in the World War Hot and Cold', 'Mechanization in Command', 'Fame and Infamy', 'Growing Up American', and 'American Ways of Life'. The pictures are accompanied by two major essays that look at the role and development of news photography at the New York Times and the relevance of what pictures were taken and which were published by the paper. A third, shorter essay on "the morgue" is a lively description of the photo archive, telling where and how the photos are stored. Together the photographs and essays shed new light on a decade that is still shadowed by misconceptions and stereotypes. This book accompanies an exhibition that opens at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in January 2002 and travels to nine American cities from New York to Boulder over the next three years.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Published to coincide with an exhibition that will visit 10 sites between January 2002 and November 2004, this glorious book presents 200 black-and-white photographs culled from the enormous New York Times archives. Here are the 1950s, with all their splendor, excitement, tragedy, humor, and sadness. Here's the aftermath of a department-store fire; the construction of an overpass; Richard Nixon in Ecuador; the April 27, 1958, Walk for Peace; Lee J. Cobb as Willie Loman in Death of a Salesman; Fidel Castro and Che Guevara in a huddled meeting; American soldiers in Korea; film director Stanley Kubrick on the set of his latest picture; and much, much more. The book is divided into sections ("America in the World"; "War Hot and Cold"; "Mechanization in Command") and contains photographs both famous and rare (there are, for example, few pictures extant of the late Kubrick). In most cases the photos are accompanied by the original newspaper captions, their publication dates, and the photographers' credits. The book also includes several essays explaining how the Times photo archives operates. But, make no mistake, the photos are the raison d'etre here: this is a picture book, and an exemplary one at that, deserving of a place alongside the best work produced by the National Geographic Society and the folks at Time-Life. David Pitt
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

From the Publisher

This book accompanies an exhibition that opens at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery in January 2002 and travels to nine American cities from New York to Boulder over the next three years.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Yale University Press (November 1, 2001)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0300088213
• ISBN-13: 978-0300088212
• Product Dimensions: 11.2 x 9.6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 3.8 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,710,818 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Tumultuous Times., March 10, 2002

By 

Robin Benson - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Tumultuous Fifties: A View from the New York Times Photo Archives (Hardcover)

A fascinating collection of two hundred large, one to a page, photos capturing the fifties. The photos are divided into five sections and each picture has a caption and credit taken from the back of the print. Page sixteen shows the back of a photo from 1953 taken in Berlin and it is a mess of crossed out picture sizes, pasted on captions, five in all, and rubber stamps, this photo has been used at least six times over the years.

I was pleased to see that most of these photos can be viewed not just as historical news images but as well crafted compositions. So many photos that we see on a daily basis (especially in the media) are purely for the moment and lack any real creative input but the ones in this book encourage you to linger and think about what the photos are saying.

Apart from the two hundred pictures there are three essays, Douglas Dreishpoon's on the background to the Times Picture Desk is particularly interesting, a twenty-one page time-line to the fifties, bibliography and index. The elegant layout and excellent printing make this book a good addition to the library of anyone interested in the recent past.

The book is published in conjunction with an exhibition of the photos that is travelling around the Nation between now and 2004

Another book of photos from the paper is 'Pictures of the Times' by Peter Galassi and Susan Kismaric, this has 154 photos covering the last century and is equally as good as 'The Tumultuous Fifties'. Both books rightly conclude that The New York Times is the world's premier daily.

***FOR AN INSIDE LOOK click 'customer images' under the cover.