Ansel Adams
Page 53
55 Adams to Merritt, December 22, 1944. Ansel sent Merritt his personally inscribed copy of the book accompanied by this letter. Surely Ansel would make certain that Merritt received it at the earliest available time. In this letter, Ansel also complained about the many problems the book faced without detailing what those were except for the lack of publicity.
56 A. Adams, “Conversations,” 415–416.
57 Sue Kunitomi Embrey, “Born Free and Equal,” Binti, ed., Born Free and Equal, 26.
58 Ansel Adams to Dorothea Lange, May 15, 1962, in M. Alinder and Stillman, Letters and Images, 281–282.
59 Dorothea Lange, “The Making of a Documentary Photographer,” an oral history conducted 1960–1961 by Suzanne B. Riess, Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 1968, 200–201.
60 Karin Becker Ohrn, “What You See Is What You Get: Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams at Manzanar,” Journalism History 4, no. 1 (spring 1977): 22.
61 N. Newhall, “Ansel Adams, Born Free and Equal,” 4.
62 Valediction 1945, published by the Associated Student Body of Manzanar High School.
63 Nishiura Weglyn, Years of Infamy, 93–102; and Hayashi, “American Concentration Camps,” 32–43.
64 A. Adams, “Conversations,” 26.
65 N. Newhall, “Ansel Adams, Born Free and Equal,” 5.
66 Senator Alan Cranston, “S.621 The Manzanar National Historic Site Act,” Senator Alan Cranston Reports to California, spring 1991.
67 At Manzanar there is a 3.2-mile self-guided auto tour, free park ranger programs, and an interpretative center with exhibits and a variety of programs, including films. In May 2006, our daughter Jasmine and I presented “An Evening with Ansel Adams” at the interpretative center (the former high school). Jasmine holds a Ph.D. in art history, specializing in the history of photography. She is the author of Moving Images, Photography and the Japanese American Incarceration, and she is a very knowledgeable speaker on these events. As we drove to Manzanar from our motel, a full moon rose over the Owens Valley and the Sierra Nevada loomed, theatrically half-obscured by a dramatic fog. We knew the night would be magical. Manzanar is close to the middle of nowhere with a low population density. Jasmine said, “Mom, what if no one comes?” My reply was that it didn’t matter. Just being in what I consider to be a sacred place and to be able to present a portion of its history would be deeply fulfilling for both of us. It turned out that the hall was packed with people. It was an enormous honor for both of us to experience this, and together.
68 Ansel Adams, Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1983), 162–167.
69 An example, Mount LeConte and Lone Pine Peak, from the Owens Valley, California (ca. 1940), is reproduced in Ansel Adams with Mary Street Alinder, Ansel Adams: An Autobiography (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1985), 263.
70 A. Adams, Examples, 164.
71 Ibid., 162–165; A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 262–263.
72 This interpretation is the idea of Tim Hill, former editor in chief of the New York Graphic Society, Ansel’s publisher from 1974 to 1979. Tim Hill to Mary Alinder, April 10, 1995.
73 A. Adams, Examples, 164–165.
74 Ibid., 66–69; Ansel Adams with Robert Baker, The Camera (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1980), fig. 1-1.
75 Photographs by Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams for “The Golden West,” “The Grandeur That Was Home,” “After the Battle,” “Detour through Purgatory,” and “Richmond Took a Beating”; photographs by Ansel Adams for “The El Solyo Deal.” All six articles in Fortune 32, no. 2 (February 1945).
76 A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 170.
77 Elizabeth Partridge, Dorothea Lange, Grab a Hunk of Lightning (San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 2013), 28.
78 Meltzer, Dorothea Lange: A Photographer’s Life, 247–249.
79 Ibid.; Gordon, Dorothea Lange, 331–339.
80 Ansel Adams, Trailer Camp Children, Richmond, California, reproduced in Ansel Adams with Robert Baker, The Print (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1983), fig. 8–9, 184–185.
81 Ibid.
82 Anne W. Tucker, “The Photo League,” in The Photo League 1936–1951 (New York: The College Art Gallery, The College at New Paltz State University of New York, and Photofind Gallery, n.d.), 2–4.
83 Lester Taikington, “Ansel Adams at the Photo League,” photo notes, March 1944 (New York: The Photo League): 4–6.
84 Philippe Halsman to Ansel Adams, December 1, 1947, in M. Alinder and Stillman, Letters and Images, 185.
85 Ansel Adams to Philippe Halsman, December 8, 1947, ibid., 186–187.
86 Photo notes, January 1948 (New York: The Photo League): 1.
87 Ansel Adams to the Photo League, photo notes, January 1948, 5.
88 Ibid.
89 A. Adams, “Conversations,” 155.
90 N. Newhall, “The Enduring Moment,” 627.
91 Ansel Adams to Walter Rosenblum, May 23, 1949, quoted in N. Newhall, “The Enduring Moment,” 632–636.
92 A. Adams, “Conversations,” 49.
93 Partridge, Dorothea Lange, 27–29.
94 David L. Jacobs, “Three Mormon Towns,” Exposure 25, no. 2 (summer 1987): 5.
95 Maitland Edey, “Three Mormon Towns,” in Maitland Edey and Constance Sullivan, Great Photographic Essays from LIFE (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1978), 154.
96 Jacobs, “Three Mormon Towns,” 7.
97 Ibid., 16.
98 Dorothea Lange and Ansel Adams, “Three Mormon Towns,” Life, September 6, 1954, 91–100; David Jacobs, “History of Three Mormon Towns,” Ansel Adams & Dorothea Lange’s Three Mormon Towns, ed. Mark Hedengren (Oakland: Oakland Museum of California, 2012), 98–99.
99 Jacobs, “Three Mormon Towns,” 7.
100 Meltzer, Dorothea Lange: A Photographer’s Life, 246.
101 Paul S. Taylor, Paul Schuster Taylor: California Social Scientist, vol. 1 (Berkeley: University of California, 1973), 242–244.
102 Jacobs, “Three Mormon Towns,” 21–22.
103 A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 268.
104 Ansel Adams to Dorothea Lange, October 25, 1954, CCP.
105 Edey, “Three Mormon Towns,” 154.
106 Gordon, Dorothea Lange, 366–370.
107 Completed under the title “Death of a Valley,” the story was published by Aperture in 1959 and exhibited at the San Francisco Museum of Art that same year. Ibid., 301–303.
108 Dorothea Lange Collection, Oakland Museum of California.
109 Partridge, Dorothea Lange, 38.
110 Therese Thau Heyman, “Ansel Adams Remembers Dorothea Lange,” in Partridge, Dorothea Lange: A Visual Life, 159. With permission of Therese Thau Heyman, The Oakland Museum of California.
16. CONCLUSIONS
1 Ansel Adams to Beaumont Newhall, March 23, 1950, CCP.
2 Ansel Adams with Mary Street Alinder, Ansel Adams: An Autobiography (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1985), 44–45.
3 Ibid., 47.
4 Stewart McBride, “Ansel,” American Photographer 4, no. 6 (December 1980): 59.
5 Beaumont Newhall to Ansel Adams, August 4, 1951, in Mary Street Alinder and Andrea Gray Stillman, eds., Ansel Adams: Letters and Images, 1916–1984 (Boston: Little, Brown, 1988), 220–221. Copyright Beaumont Newhall, Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Estate, courtesy of Scheinbaum & Russek Ltd., Santa Fe, New Mexico.
6 A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 381–385.
7 Nancy Newhall, “The Enduring Moment” [unpublished manuscript], 753–754.
8 Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, December 14, 1952, CCP.
9 A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 383.
10 Ansel Adams and Nancy Newhall, “Canyon de Chelly National Monument, Arizona,” Arizona Highways, June 1952, 18–27; “Sunset Crater,” Arizona Highways, July 1952; “The Shell of Tumacacori,” Arizona Highways, November 1952, 4–13; “Death Valley,” Arizona Highways, Octo
ber 1953, 16–35; “Organ Pipe,” Arizona Highways, January 1954; “Mission San Xavier del Bac,” Arizona Highways, April 1954, 12–35.
One other collaborative article was published in 1968, though Nancy did not have any creative control over its presentation, as she had with the others: Ansel Adams and Nancy Newhall, “Mary Austin’s Country,” Arizona Highways, April 1968, 6.
11 Malin Wilson, “Walking on the Desert in the Sky,” The Desert Is No Lady (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1987), 57–60.
12 Ansel Adams and Nancy Newhall, Death Valley (Redwood City, Calif.: 5 Associates, 1954); Ansel Adams and Nancy Newhall, Mission San Xavier del Bac (Redwood City, Calif.: 5 Associates, 1954).
13 A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 214–215.
14 Nancy Newhall to Ansel Adams, June 17, 1952, CCP. Copyright Nancy Newhall, Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Estate, courtesy of Scheinbaum & Russek Ltd., Santa Fe, New Mexico.
15 Doris Leonard, interview with the author, September 11, 1995.
16 Ansel Adams and Nancy Newhall, The Pageant of History and the Panorama of Today in Northern California (San Francisco: American Trust Company, 1954).
17 Ansel Adams, Photographer. Script by Nancy Newhall; produced by Larry Dawson; directed by David Meyers, 1957.
18 Ansel Adams, Yosemite Valley, ed. Nancy Newhall (San Francisco: 5 Associates, 1959); Ansel Adams and Nancy Newhall, A More Beautiful America (New York: American Conservation Association, 1965); Ansel Adams and Nancy Newhall, Fiat Lux: The University of California (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Company, 1967); Ansel Adams and Nancy Newhall, The Tetons and the Yellowstone (Redwood City, Calif.: 5 Associates, 1970).
19 Peter C. Bunnell, Minor White: The Eye That Shapes (Princeton: The Art Museum, Princeton University, 1989); Walter P. Paepcke, “Memorandum of Conversation with Mr. Edward Steichen, Museum of Modern Art, Regarding September 1–8 Photo Seminar at Aspen” [July 1952], CCP.
20 Berenice Abbott, “Objectives for Photography,” Aspen Institute Conference on Photography, October 6, 1951.
21 Ken Conner and Debra Heimerdinger, Horace Bristol: An American View (San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 1996), 37.
22 A Study of the Accumulative Audience of LIFE, survey conducted for Life magazine (New York: Alfred Politz Research, 1950), 20.
23 Marc Silver, “Aperture Magazine under the Editorship of Minor White 1952–1964,” master’s thesis, University of Pittsburgh, 1989, 12.
24 Theodore Peterson, Magazines in the Twentieth Century (Urbana, Ill.: University of Illinois Press, 1964), 350.
25 Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, November 25, 1945, CCP.
26 Bunnell, Minor White, 7.
27 Jasmine A. Alinder, “The Conception and Founding of Aperture,” Junior thesis, Princeton University, 1990, 5–6. For much of the information about the founding of Aperture and its relationship to the world of publishing, I am indebted to the scholarship of our daughter, Dr. Jasmine Alinder.
28 Nancy Newhall to Minor White, February 27, 1952, Minor White Archive, Princeton University. Copyright Nancy Newhall, Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Estate, courtesy of Scheinbaum & Russek Ltd., Santa Fe, New Mexico.
29 Jasmine Alinder, “The Conception and Founding of Aperture,” 24.
30 Beaumont Newhall to Ansel Adams, March 15, 1952, CCP.
31 Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, March 10, 1952, CCP.
32 Minor White, ed., Aperture 1, no. 1.
33 Jasmine Alinder, “The Conception and Founding of Aperture,” 28–29.
34 Minor White, Dorothea Lange, Nancy Newhall, Ansel Adams, Beaumont Newhall, Barbara Morgan, Ernest Louie, Melton Ferris, Dody Warren, “1952: About Aperture,” Aperture 1, no. 1; Peter C. Bunnell, ed., Aperture Magazine Anthology: The Minor White Years, 1952–1976 (New York: Aperture Foundation, 2012).
35 Beaumont Newhall to Ansel Adams, July 13, 1960. Copyright Beaumont Newhall, Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Estate, courtesy of Scheinbaum & Russek Ltd., Santa Fe, New Mexico.
36 Nancy Newhall to Minor White, June 23, 1952, Minor White Archive, Princeton University; Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, July 2, 1952, CCP; Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, August 30, 1952, CCP.
37 Aperture Foundation and its Burden Gallery is at 547 W. 27th Street, 4th floor, New York, NY 10001. An annual subscription to Aperture is $75 in 2014.
38 Beaumont Newhall, “The Beginning,” Peter C. Bunnell, “Why The Friends?” and James G. Alinder, “The Friends: A Retrospective View,” Light Years, Untitled 43 (Carmel: The Friends of Photography, 1987).
39 Ibid.
40 Ansel Adams to Beaumont and Nancy Newhall, March 11, 1974, CCP. Letter reprinted in A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 218, without his charges about their smoking.
41 Liliane De Cock, interview with the author, September 20, 1995.
42 Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, January 25, 1961, in M. Alinder and Stillman, Letters and Images, 268–269; Ansel Adams to Beaumont and Nancy Newhall, September 13, 1973, ibid., 318–321.
43 Ansel Adams, “Conversations with Ansel Adams,” an oral history conducted 1972, 1974, 1975 by Ruth Teiser and Catherine Harroun, Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 1978, 404.
44 Ibid., 740.
45 Beaumont Newhall, Focus: A Life in Photography (Boston: Bulfinch Press, 1993), 245–246; A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 218–219. Some of the details of Nancy’s death I learned only in conversation with Beaumont in 1987.
46 Ansel Adams to Beaumont Newhall, July 10, 1974, in M. Alinder and Stillman, Letters and Images, 333.
47 Letter from Ansel Adams to Beaumont Newhall, August 18, 1974, ibid., 334; Virginia Adams, interview with the author, March 21, 1993.
48 Virginia Adams, interview with the author, May 17, 1988; David Scheinbaum, interview with the author, October 3, 1995.
49 Newhall, Focus, 246–247. Copyright Beaumont Newhall, Beaumont and Nancy Newhall Estate, courtesy of Scheinbaum & Russek Ltd., Santa Fe, New Mexico.
50 Ibid., 247–248.
51 Christi Newhall and David Scheinbaum to Jim and Mary Alinder, April 23, 1993.
17. ANOTHER PATH
1 Ansel Adams to Beaumont and Nancy Newhall, September 30, 1952, CCP.
2 Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, June 20, 1952, CCP.
3 Ansel Adams with Mary Street Alinder, Ansel Adams: An Autobiography (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1985), 159.
4 Ansel Adams, “Conversations with Ansel Adams,” an oral history conducted 1972, 1974, 1975 by Ruth Teiser and Catherine Harroun, Regional Oral History Office, The Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley, 1978, 118.
5 Peter C. Wensberg, Land’s Polaroid: A Company and the Man Who Invented It (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1987), 25–30.
6 Ibid., 64–65.
7 Ibid., 83.
8 “A summary of some of the important dates in the history of Polaroid Land photography,” Cambridge, Mass.: Polaroid Corporation. Brochure.
9 Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, December 8, 1948, CCP.
10 A. Adams, “Conversations,” 117. In Ansel Adams: An Autobiography, 293, writing some thirty years after the event, Ansel recalled being taken to the Lands’ for a party and the next morning going to the lab. In a 1972 interview for his oral history, Ansel said that he was present at the Optical Society of America meeting at which Land first introduced the Polaroid process, but this cannot be true, because on February 21, 1947, he was actually in Big Bend National Park, Texas.
11 In a 1945 letter, Ansel wrote to Nancy Newhall that Polaroid had invited him to come visit the plant in Cambridge and make photographs using Polaroid materials, but nothing seems to have come of this. Ansel Adams to Nancy Newhall, November 25, 1945, CCP.
12 From Beaumont Newhall’s journal, reproduced in Nancy Newhall, “The Enduring Moment,” [unpublished manuscript], 673.
13 A. Adams, “Conversations,” 118; David and Victoria Sheff, “The Playboy Interview,” Playboy, May 1983, 84.
14 Ansel Adams,
“How I Use the Polaroid Camera” (illustrated with twelve photographs), Modern Photography, September 1951, 36–39, 80, 82.
15 Ansel Adams, “Introduction,” in Ansel Adams with Robert Baker, Polaroid Land Photography (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1978), ix–x; A. Adams, “Conversations,” 120; Mary Street Alinder, “Ansel Adams’ Polaroid Connection, Part II,” The Polaroid Newsletter for Photographic Education 4, nos. 3 and 4 (summer–fall 1987): 3.
16 Ansel Adams, Camera & Lens (New York: Morgan and Lester, 1948).
17 Ansel Adams, Natural-Light Photography (New York: Morgan and Morgan, 1952).
18 Ansel Adams to Edwin Land, January 10, 1950, quoted in A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 295–296.
19 Wensberg, Land’s Polaroid, 129–132.
20 A. Adams, “Conversations,” 39.
21 A. Adams with Baker, Polaroid Land Photography, 45–47.
22 Imogen Cunningham to Ansel Adams, quoted in A. Adams with M. Alinder, Autobiography, 301. Courtesy of the Imogen Cunningham Trust. Her self-portrait is reproduced on page 300 of the same book.
23 Ansel Adams to Beaumont and Nancy Newhall, April 15, 1961, CCP.
24 A. Adams, “Conversations,” 522.
25 Ansel Adams, Examples: The Making of 40 Photographs (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1983), 44–47.
26 Ansel Adams, Singular Images (Boston: New York Graphic Society, 1974).
27 Edwin Land, “Private Ruminations on Looking at Ansel Adams’ Photographs,” ibid.
28 Ansel confessed to me his great bewilderment at the Lands’ canceling the museum; he was too embarrassed to ask them for an explanation.
Terre Land was the financial sponsor of twenty-one of the twenty-six interviews conducted in 1972–1975 for Ansel’s oral history, on behalf of The Bancroft Library, University of California. The Sierra Club paid for the remaining five interviews. Ruth Teiser, “Remembering Ansel Adams,” Bancroftiana 99 (Berkeley: University of California, October 1989): 2. For many years the imperious Terre Land would “winter” in a suite of rooms at the Arizona Inn in Tucson. Virginia was expected to accompany her, tucked into one small rom as an apparent lady-in-waiting. Virginia resented the entire situation, but Ansel would remind her that she had no choice.