Victor Jorgensen is a former
Navy photo journalist who probably is most famous for taking a photograph of an impromptu scene in
Manhattan on August 14, 1945, but from a different angle and in a less dramatic exposure than that of a photograph taken by
Alfred Eisenstaedt. Both photographs were of the same V-J Day embrace of a nurse by a sailor. Eisenstaedt's better known photograph,
V–J day in Times Square was published in
Life.
On the day after the images were taken by the two photographers, the one taken by Jorgensen was published in the
New York Times. His photograph, which was taken while he was on duty, is retained in the
national archives. A copy of it is displayed to the right.
World War II photographer
Jorgensen was one of the initial six photographers recruited by Cmdr
Edward Steichen for his
Naval Aviation Photographic Unit in 1942.
Faces of War: The Untold Story of Edward Steichen's WWII Photographers, pg. 48, Mark D. Faram, Berkeley Caliber, New York, New York, 2009, ISBN 978-0-425-22140-2
Jorgensen toured around the world during
World War II taking photographs for the military. While aboard the
USS Monterey he captured Navy pilots in the forward elevator well of the ship playing basketball during June of 1944. That photograph is displayed below and one of the subjects, the jumper of the left, is
Gerald Ford, who later became the president of the United States upon the resignation of...
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