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Charlotte Brooks
Charlotte Brooks, by Patricia Carbine, 1957
LC-DIG-ppmsca-09865

Women Photojournalists

Prints & Photographs Division Holdings
Overview: 1800s-1900s | 1910s-1920s | 1930s-1950s | 1960s-1990s | Related Resources | Bibliography

Overview

The Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division preserves millions of images that were created for publication in magazines and newspapers. This overview highlights the work of women photojournalists represented in the Library’s collections, because interest in studying their roles, lives, and accomplishments is growing. Additional biographical and collection summary information is in preparation for many of the individuals listed below.

Pioneers who worked in the late 1800s and early 1900s

  • Jessie Tarbox Beals (1870-1942)
  • Zaida Ben-Yusuf (1869-1933)
  • Gerhard Sisters of St. Louis (photographed 1890s to 1936)
  • Frances Benjamin Johnston (1864-1952) [view Collection summary]
  • Gertrude Käsebier (1852-1934)
  • Alice Rohe (1876-1957)

Women who entered the field in the late 1910s to 1920s

  • M. Thérèse Bonney (1894-1978) [view Biographical sketch]
  • Helen Johns Kirtland (1890-1979) [view Overview] New!
  • Lisette Model (1901-1983)
  • Tina Modotti (1896-1942) 
  • “Matsy” Wynn Richards (1888-1960) [Note: Search in PPOC under Wynn Richards]
  • Eleanor Butler Roosevelt (1889-1960)   
  • Doris Ulmann (1882-1934)

Women who came to prominence in the 1930s to 1950s

Women who joined the profession in the 1960s to 1990s

Related Resources at the Library of Congress

Women Come to the Front: Journalists, Photographers, and Broadcasters during World War II (online exhibition)
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/wcf/.

Photojournalism Collections:

"Photojournalism Collections" in American Women
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/awhhtml/awpnp6/photojournalism.html.

George Grantham Bain Collection
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/awhhtml/awpnp6/Bain_coll.html.

Look Magazine Photograph Collection
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/pp/lookhtml/lookback.html.

Women photographer's names are available through an online index to this collection [view online index]

National Photo Company Collection
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/pp/npcohtml/npcoabt.html.

New York World-Telegram & Sun Newspaper Photograph Collection http://www.loc.gov/rr/print/coll/130_nyw.html.

U.S. News & World Report Magazine Photograph Collection (USNWR), http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/awhhtml/awpnp6/usnews_coll.html.

Bibliography

Carlebach, Michael L. The Origins of Photojournalism in America. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1992. Call number: TR820.C357 1992

---. American Photojournalism Comes of Age. Washington, DC: Smithsonian Institution Press, 1997. Call number: TR820.C356 1997

---, and Eugene F. Provenzo. Farm Security Administration Photographs of Florida. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 1993. Call number: F312.C37 1993

Gover, C. Jane. The Positive Image: Women Photographers in Turn of the Century America. Albany: State University of New York, 1988. Call number:  TR23.G68 1988

McCusker, Carol. Breaking the Frame: Pioneering Women in Photojournalism. San Diego: Museum of Photographic Arts, 2006. ISBN: 1-878062-06-9 (No copy in the Library of Congress.)

Mitchell, Margaretta K. Recollections: Ten Women of Photography. New York: Viking Press, 1979. Call number: TR139.R38

Morgan, Margaret Knox. “Women in Photojournalism.” Popular Photography 54 (Feb. 1964): 41, 80-83. Call number:  TR1.P8845

Moutoussamy-Ashe, Jeanne. Viewfinders: Black Women Photographers. New York: Dodd, Mead, 1986. Call number: TR139.M63 1986 Biog

Newman, Cathy. Women Photographers at National Geographic. Washington, DC: National Geographic, 2002. Call number: TR139 .N49 2000

Panzer, Mary. Things As They Are. New York: Aperture Foundation/World Press Photo, 2005.
Call number: MLCL 2006/40058

Rosenblum, Naomi. A History of Women Photographers.  2d ed. New York: Abbeville Press, 2000. Call number: TR139.R67 2000

Sullivan, Constance, ed. Women Photographers. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1990. Call number: TR650.W65 1990

Tucker, Anne, ed. The Woman’s Eye. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1973. Call number:  TR650.T78 1973


Prepared by: Beverly Brannan, Curator of Photography. Last revised: September 2007.


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  July 16, 2008
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