Morris has told this story hundreds of times since 1947, almost word for word every time (to judge by the dozens of such performances on record in print, audio, and video formats). Suddenly, at the age of 98, he conveniently recalls a crucial new detail for the very first time. I find it impossible to take seriously Morris’s recovered memory of the purported “advance packet” he now claims to have received on June 7, 1944 containing Capa’s pre-invasion films. […]
|
Follow me on Mastodon:
@adcoleman@hcommons.social
 |
Richard Whelan’s account of Capa’s D-Day films qualifies as neither competent research nor responsible historianship. It constitutes the desperate Hail Mary pass of the terminally compromised and corrupted hireling. A perfect illustration of the dilemma of the bespoke, in-house curator and historian in the employ of the subject, or his or her estate, or some other entity with a vested interest in the outcome of the research. […] The physical evidence proves inarguably that the persistent sprocket-hole intrusion in Capa’s exposures did not result from the mythical one-time “emulsion melt” in LIFE’s London darkroom, but instead represents a persistent minor malfunction in one of Capa’s two Contaxes. It is visible to the naked eye in dozens of Capa’s rolls of 35mm film from January 1944 onward. The fact that some rolls don’t show this suggests that they were made with his second Contax, which didn’t have this problem. It also indicates that no one at LIFE noticed or cared about this enough to advise Capa to get his camera checked and realigned. […] The first of Capa’s Omaha Beach exposures shows the troops disembarking from the LCI on which Capa arrived. The next to last shows Pfc. Huston Riley, who recalls that immediately after helping to rescue him Capa ran for an outgoing LCI. In his memoir “Slightly Out of Focus,” Capa himself states that after he reached that LCI he made no more images of the battle. Thus the “magnificent eleven” constitute not just what Morris managed to “save” but the entirety of Capa’s take from Omaha Beach. […] |
 SPJ Research Award 2014All content of this publication is © copyright 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 by A. D. Coleman unless otherwise noted. All materials contained on this site are protected by United States copyright law and may not be reproduced for commercial purposes without prior written permission. All photos copyright by the individual photographers. "Fair use" allows quotation of excerpts of textual material from this site for educational and other noncommercial purposes.
Published by Flying Dragon LLC.
|
Alternate History: Robert Capa on D-Day (13)
Robert Capa’s missing and supposedly destroyed D-Day negatives — the ones he shipped to London from Weymouth on the morning of June 7, the ones purportedly destroyed in a freak darkroom accident that night — sit today, intact and available for study, where they’ve sat for years: in the Robert Capa and Cornell Capa Archive at the International Center of Photography in New York. […]