Since the invention of the camera, American achievement, courage, challenges, and celebration have been captured on film by photographers documenting both our present and our past. Some of these images are so representative of their era that they have become iconic. These famous photographs capture our attention and imagination as we see a piece of history at the moment in which it happened. Presented here are five such famous photos, each depicting a uniquely American moment.
Migrant Mother
Florence Thompson and her three children living in a tent in a pea-pickers camp in Nipomo Valley, California.
Photographer: Dorothea Lange
1936
Photo from Library of Congress
First Powered Flight
The Wright Flyer airborne during the first powered flight at Kitty Hawk, North Carolina. Orville Wright is the pilot while Wilbur Wright runs alongside.
1903
Photo from Library of Congress
Flag Raising on Iwo Jima
Photograph of soldiers raising the U.S. flag on Iwo Jima.
Photographer: Joe Rosenthal for Associated Press
February 23, 1945
Photo from U.S. National Archives and Records Administration
Times Square Victory Celebration
New York City celebrating the surrender of Japan. They threw anything and kissed anybody in Times Square.
August 14, 1945
Photo from U.S. National Archives and Records Administration
Lunch Atop a Skyscraper
Lunch atop a skyscraper, published in the New York Herald-Tribune.
Photographer: Charles Clyde Ebbets, Tom Kelley, or William Leftwich
September 20, 1932
Photo from New York Public Library
As long as there is life, adversity, victory, progress, achievement on display, there will be photographers immortalizing the moment on film. What pictures from today do you think will be tomorrow’s iconic images?
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