George Tames

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George Tames (born January 21, 1919, in Washington D.C) was an American photographer for The New York Times from 1945-1985. As a newspaper photographer, Tames was a regular on Capitol Hill over a span of forty years.

Contents 1 Biography 2 Photography 3 Quotations 4 References 5 External links

[edit] Biography

A first generation American who couldn't speak English when he went to school, he dropped out of high school in the tenth grade, and went to work to help out the family since there just wasn't any money. Being the oldest his parents gave him the responsibility to watch over his younger brothers and sisters.

He came to Capitol Hill in 1940 where his career in photography began, going with the photographers on jobs and eventually photographing individual members. He photographed Harry Truman's War Investigating Committee. He developed access to and captured the likeness of numerous members of the United States, and had his work reproduced in many influential publications. He developed a style contrary to the "herd instinct" of press photographers, demonstrating his artistic eye, sense of place, and special intimacy with his subjects.

[edit] Photography

Tames took countless Washington shots, but (by his own admission) is particularly remembered for one, "The Loneliest Job," a photograph of President John F. Kennedy. As he explained in an interview late in life, the took the photograph through the door of the Oval Office, after Kennedy thought he had left:

President Kennedy's back was broken during the war, when that torpedo boat of his was hit by the Japanese destroyer. As a result of that injury he wore a brace on his back most of his life. Quite a few people didn't realize that. Also he could never sit for any length of time, more than thirty or forty minutes in a chair without having to get up and walk around. Particularly when it felt bad he had a habit, in the House, and the Senate, and into the presidency, of carrying his weight on his shoulders, literally, by leaning over a desk, putting down his palms out flat, and leaning over and carrying the weight of his upper body by his shoulder muscles, and sort of stretching or easing his back. He would read and work that way, which was something I had seen him do many times. When I saw him doing that, I walked in, stood by his rocking chair, and then I looked down and framed him between the two windows, and I shot that picture.^[1]

[edit] Quotations

• "'Why are you a Democrat?' I say, 'I was born into the Democratic party, the same way I was born into the Greek Orthodox Church.'"[1]
• "If there is anyone that should be a Republican or an ultra conservative, it's me, because I have not only conquered the fact that I had only a tenth grade education, but based on the friendships that I made, and the betting on people, like Mr. J. Willard Marriott."[2]
• "My mother's reference to Roosevelt would be "Ieous", which is the Greek word for saintly, Saintly Roosevelt. She would refer to Hoover as "garata," which means someone with horns, like a goat. So that's how I reckoned my own feelings. Then also in every Greek Orthodox family there's a holy corner, usually in the bedroom of the parents, and it faces east."[3]

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Oral History of George Tames by the Senate Historical Office