Larry Burrows

Template:Short description Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox person Henry Frank Leslie Burrows (29 May 1926 – 10 February 1971), known as Larry Burrows, was an English photojournalist. He spent 9 years covering the Vietnam War.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Early career

Burrows began his career in the art department of the Daily Express newspaper in 1942 in London. He learned photography and moved to work in the darkrooms of the Keystone photography agency and Life Magazine.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> It was here that Burrows started to be called Larry to avoid confusion with another Henry working in the same office.<ref name=":1">Template:Cite magazine</ref> It was not unknown for him to redo a whole day of work in order to secure the best result.<ref name=":5">Template:Cite book</ref>

Some accounts blame Burrows for melting photographer Robert Capa's D-Day negatives in the drying cabinet,<ref>Flying Short Course: Evolving Newspapers Pushing Photojournalists For Video Template:Webarchive</ref> but in fact it was another technician, according to John G. Morris.<ref>Morris blames it on a young developer named Dennis Banks. John G. Morris, "Get the picture, A personal history of photojournalism", Random House Inc, N-Y 1998</ref>

Photojournalism

Burrows had an early success with his coverage of the demolition of the Heligoland U-Boat Pens in 1947. Working for the Associated Press, Burrows was a passenger in a De Havilland Dragon Rapide. Officially they were supposed to go no closer than Template:Convert to the island. However, Burrows persuaded the pilot to fly over at only Template:Convert, knocking out the window perspex when it obscured his shot. For his efforts he was able to take eleven images and earned himself two pages in Life magazine.<ref name=":0">Template:Cite news</ref>

Burrows would go on to cover stories in Suez, Lebanon, Cyprus, Central Africa, and Vietnam.<ref name=":5" />

He was described in The Times as an "equipment man" and quoted as saying, "When I take the lot with me there are twenty-six cases".<ref name=":0" />

In early 1971, Burrows was elected a fellow of the Royal Photographic Society.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Vietnam

Template:See also Burrows went on to become a photographer and covered the war in Vietnam from 1962 until his death in 1971.<ref name="nytimes">Template:Cite news</ref>

One of Burrows' most famous images was published first in a Life magazine article on 16 April 1965 named One Ride with Yankee Papa 13, about a mission on 31 March 1965.<ref>Template:Cite magazine</ref>

Flying in a helicopter with the US Marines' Medium Helicopter Squadron 163, Burrows captured the death of Yankee Papa 3 co-pilot Lieutenant James Magel. At the landing zone Magel was assisted to Yankee Papa 13, where airborne door gunner Lance C. Farley gave first aid. It was to no avail and Burrows captured Farley's distress at the loss of his comrade.<ref name=":6" /><ref>Template:Cite news</ref>

Of the photograph Burrows said:<ref name=":6">Template:Cite book</ref>

It's not easy to photograph a man dying in the arms of a fellow countryman... Was I simply capitalizing on the other men's grief? I concluded that what I was doing would penetrate the hearts of those at home who are simply too indifferent.{{#if:Larry Burrows|{{#if:|}}

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Reaching Out was another famous image. It features US Marine Gunnery Sgt. Jeremiah Purdie, who while wounded, is seen reaching out to wounded Lance Corporal Roger Dale Treadway.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref><ref name=":4">{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

Life.com editor Ben Cosgrove said of the photograph:<ref name=":4" />

Larry Burrows made a photograph that, for generations, has served as the most indelible, searing illustration of the horrors inherent in that long, divisive war — and, by implication, in all wars.{{#if:Ben Cosgrove|{{#if:|}}

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Reaching Out was taken on 5 October 1966 after the Marines were ambushed on Mutter's Ridge. However, the image was not featured in Life until February 1971, following Burrows' death.<ref name=":5" /><ref name=":4" />

Death

Burrows died on 10 February 1971 with fellow photojournalists Henri Huet (Associated Press), Kent Potter (United Press International) and Keisaburo Shimamoto (freelancer with Newsweek),<ref name=":2">Template:Cite magazine</ref> when their helicopter was shot down over the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos<ref name="nytimes" /> as the group covered Operation Lam Son 719.<ref name=":2" />

Following his death the Managing Editor of Life, Ralph Graves, said of Burrows:<ref name=":5" />

I do not think it is demeaning to any other photographer in the world for me to say that Larry Burrows was the single bravest and most dedicated war photographer I know of.{{#if:Ralph Graves|{{#if:|}}

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Of his work, Burrows himself said, "I cannot afford the luxury of thinking about what could happen to me".<ref name=":5" />

In 1985, the Laurence Miller Gallery in New York published a portfolio of Burrows' prints, with the assistance of his son Russell Burrows.<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> In 2002, Burrows' posthumous book Vietnam was awarded the Prix Nadar award.<ref name=":3">Template:Cite news</ref>

In 2008 the remains of Burrows and fellow photographers Huet, Potter and Shimamoto were honoured and interred at the Newseum in Washington, D.C.<ref name=":1" />

Journalist David Halberstam paid tribute to Burrows in the 1997 book Requiem: By the Photographers Who Died in Vietnam and Indochina:<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

I must mention Larry Burrows in particular. To us younger men who had not yet earned reputations, he was a sainted figure. He was a truly beautiful man, modest, graceful, a star who never behaved like one. He was generous to all, a man who gave lessons to his colleagues not just on how to take photographs but, more important, on how to behave like a human being, how to be both colleague and mentor. Our experience of the star system in photography was, until we met him, not necessarily a happy one; all too often talent and ego seemed to come together in equal amounts. We were touched by Larry: How could someone so talented be so graceful?{{#if:David HalberstamRequiem: By the Photographers Who Died in Vietnam and Indochina|{{#if:|}}

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In December 2019, the Newseum was closed due to financial difficulties and the remains of Burrows, Huet, Potter and Shimamoto were disinterred. Their remains are currently stored at the Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency lab at Offutt Air Force Base awaiting a permanent burial place.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

In 2021, Burrows was posthumously inducted into the International Photography Hall of Fame and Museum.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

See also

• List of journalists killed and missing in the Vietnam War

External links

• "Bardot, TS Eliot, JFK: the lens of Larry Burrows – in pictures" in The Guardian
• "The Vietnam war captured in colour – in pictures" in The Guardian
• Photographs at The Digital Journalist
• Popular Photography Magazine, Larry Burrows - A photographer's own story
• LIFE Magazine Feb. 19, 1971 Editor's Note about Burrows' death