Page 116 – LIFE

Suburban Time Capsule: A School Bus Stop, 1971

July 30, 2020September 4, 2013 by

In 1971, LIFE magazine published a special double issue called, simply, “Children.” In the issue, LIFE’s editors sought to peer into what they characterized as “a secret world” the world of childhood. One of the sweetest features was a series of pictures by Ralph Morse chronicling the goings-on at school bus stops near his home in northern New Jersey.

As LIFE put it, introducing Morse’s photographs:

On a certain morning in September, two dozen children stand waiting along a road in Rockaway, N.J., eyeing each other warily and going through their own private first-day-of-school crises, until at last the school bus comes. LIFE photographer Ralph Morse was at the bus stop that day and on many other mornings in the next two months. He watched the stiffness disappear and a bouncy little society emerge. Long before the first snow fell, he knew every member well: the cutups, the bullies, the loners, the flirts.

Here are some of the images that capture the intense, singular, “bouncy little society” of the suburban school bus stop, circa 1971.

School bus stop, New Jersey, 1971

Ralph Morse/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Moms wave to their kids at a school bus stop, New Jersey, 1971

Ralph Morse/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

When Skateboarding Was Young

January 5, 2020September 3, 2013 by

A teeter-totter on wheels is the new fad and menace. . . .

Thus did LIFE introduce to the magazine’s readers its own unique (if somewhat shrill) take on a toy that would evolve into the emblem of a singular subculture and, eventually, a lifestyle.

Skateboarding, LIFE opined in 1965, is “the most exhilarating and dangerous joyriding device this side of the hot rod. A two-foot piece of wood or plastic mounted on wheels, it yields to the skillful user the excitements of skiing or surfing. To the unskilled it gives the effect of having stepped on a banana peel while dashing down the back stairs. It is also a menace to limb and even to life.” In the previous month, the magazine noted, two children in different parts of the country had been killed when they careened into traffic while skateboarding.

By now it has long since it would develop that grown men and women could make a nice living as skateboarders inking endorsement deals and competing at skateboard contests. Skateboarders such as Tony Hawk and Marisa Dal Santo—not to mention winter offspring like Shaun White and Gretchen Bleiler—emerged as breakout stars of both sport and pop culture. Industries of clothing, gear and skateboard park construction, established themselves, and the appeal of the sport exploded. But back then, LIFE could safely assume that at least some of its millions of readers had absolutely no clue what skateboarding entailed . . . or what a skateboard was.

Here, LIFE.com looks back at the early, thrillingly anarchic days of a quintessentially American sport and pastime that, over the years, has been embraced by millions around the world while still retaining its rebel cred. Skateboarding is no crime—but some of these skateboarding images feel criminally fun.

Liz Ronk edited this gallery for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter @lizabethronk.

Skateboarding in New York City, 1965

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Nineteen-year-old Patti McGee, the 1965 “National Girls’ Champion” became, in 2010, the first female inductee into the International Association of Skateboard Companies (IASC) Skateboard Hall of Fame.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Life Magazine May 14, 1965

Surf, Sand and Sun: LIFE’s Ode to Beach Bums, 1950

August 11, 2021August 30, 2013 by

In February 1950, LIFE published a feature on what the magazine called “the gold-bricking existence” of ski bums at Sun Valley, Idaho. Eight months later, in its August 28 issue, LIFE published a follow-up piece with the wonderful title, “LIFE Revisits the Ski Bums (and Finds That They Are Now Beach Bums).”

“Photographer Loomis Dean,” LIFE told its readers, “looked up his cold-weather friends and found them still leading a bum’s life.”

Now, however, they are beach bums, spending the summer at San Onofre, Calif., 70 miles south of Los Angeles, where they take as much delight in surfboarding on rolling waves as they did in winter schussing down snowy slopes.

In May, as soon as the snow gets soft at Sun Valley, the bums begin to migrate. They head first for their parents’ homes where they drop off their skis and pick up their brightly colored, 15-foot-long surfboards. Then they make for the beach. . . . On the beach the bums spend every minute they can surfboarding, sunning, guzzling beer, making friends with people who come down to be weekend beach bums. By taking jobs nearby as packers, lifeguards, bartenders, they earn just enough to fill their cups and stomachs and gas tanks of the trucks in which they live and sleep. If war does not catch up with them one way or another, the bums expect to be back at Sun Valley by November.

Here, in tribute to that rare individual self-assured enough to scoff at societal expectations and embrace his or her inner bum, LIFE.com remembers the few, the proud, the charmingly, unrepentantly feckless.

San Onofre, Calif., 1950.

Loomis Dean/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

After tossing his crutches up on the beach, a surfer hobbled over to his surfboard and waited for a receding wave to carry him away from the shore.

Loomis Dean/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Surfers, San Onofre, Calif., 1950.

Loomis Dean/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

San Onofre, Calif., 1950.

Loomis Dean/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

“Hammerhead” Gravage dozed inside of a blanket after surfing all day, San Onofre, Calif., 1950.

Loomis Dean/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

San Onofre, Calif., 1950.

Loomis Dean/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

“Hammerhead” Gravage poured a cold beer for “Burrhead” Grever.

Loomis Dean/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Haircutter to all the beach bums was Myra Roche, mother of three children. She helped friend Warren Miller make ends meet by shearing his hair for free.

Loomis Dean/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

San Onofre, Calif., 1950.

Loomis Dean/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

San Onofre, Calif., 1950.

Loomis Dean Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Udder Bliss: A Cow, Three Cats and Some (Very) Fresh Milk

January 17, 2020August 29, 2013 by

In 1954, LIFE photographer Nat Farbman made a series of pictures of some enterprising (and entertaining) felines on Art Badertscher’s dairy farm near Fresno, Calif. It seems that one of Badertscher’s cats, Squirrley, rose up on her hind legs one day for a squirt of milk right from a cow’s udder and ever since, the farmer had been training all of the farm’s cats to do the same.

In Farbman’s most famous picture of the critters—the shot above that has been reproduced countless times through the years—Brownie (Squirrley’s son) makes a perfect catch while Blackie, a stray that “just wandered in one day and joined the act,” waits his turn.

Brownie drank milk straight from the cow as Blackie waited his turn at a dairy farm in Fresno, Calif., in 1953.

Nat Farbman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Cats begged for squirts of milk during milking at Arch Badertscher’s dairy farm.

Nat Farbman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Cats enjoyed squirts of milk at Arch Badertscher’s dairy farm.

Nat Farbman The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

March on Washington: Rare Photos of a Star-Studded Fundraiser, 1963

January 15, 2021August 27, 2013 by

Attracting star power to the civil rights movement was as much about raising money as it was about galvanizing public support. Fundraisers held across the country in 1963 often featured celebrities and artists on hand to help raise cash for the March on Washington. One of these events took place just a few weeks before the March, in Birmingham, Ala., where violent clashes between local police and young protesters in May 1963 spurred the momentum that culminated in the March on Washington in late August.

Dubbed a “Salute to Freedom,” the concert was held at Miles College and included appearances by Martin Luther King Jr., Ray Charles, Nina Simone, Johnny Mathis, James Baldwin and other political and pop-culture stars. Proceeds from the show helped cover transportation costs for Alabamans who went to Washington just weeks later.

None of the photos in this gallery were ever published in LIFE.

Martin Luther King Jr. (seated, at right) watched the Shirelles perform during the Salute to Freedom benefit concert in Birmingham, Ala., August 5, 1963.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Author James Baldwin looked out at the crowd.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Ray Charles performed.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

The crowd reacted during the Salute to Freedom benefit concert in Birmingham, Ala.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

The Salute to Freedom benefit concert in Birmingham, Ala.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Joey Adams (left), president of the American Guild of Variety Artists, on stage with the Shirelles.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Nina Simone performed.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Fans enjoyed the concert.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Martin Luther King Jr. (left) and an unidentified man addressed the crowd.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

The Salute to Freedom benefit concert in Birmingham, Ala., August 5, 1963.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

A man held an American Guild of Variety Artists banner during the Salute to Freedom benefit concert in Birmingham, Ala., August 5, 1963.

Grey Villet/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Photographer Spotlight: Bill Ray’s Classic Celebrity Portraits

December 23, 2021August 25, 2013 by

Whether he was shooting as a staff photographer for LIFE or freelancing for other major publications—Smithsonian, Fortune, Newsweek—Bill Ray never shied from an assignment, however large or (seemingly) small, during the course of his long career. Global events and quiet moments; armed conflicts and avant-garde artists; the grit and menace of the early Hells Angels and the bracing glamor of the Camelot years, he covered it all.

“I threw myself, one hundred percent, into every shoot,” Ray said. “And I loved it.”

For this Photographer Spotlight, however, LIFE.com focussed on one aspect of Ray’s varied portfolio: celebrity portraits.

Even a partial roll call of the stars Bill Ray photographed for LIFE reads like a Who’s Who of Sixties pop culture: Marilyn Monroe, Sinatra, the Beatles, Natalie Wood, Elizabeth Taylor, Elvis, Steve McQueen, Jackie Kennedy and on and on and on. What’s truly remarkable is that he managed to capture something utterly distinctive about each one.

It’s difficult to imagine one photographer capable of showing us something elemental about personalities as wildly disparate as, say, Brigitte Bardot, Sonny Liston and Woody Allen, but Bill Ray did just that, again and again.

Some photo captions in this gallery include Ray’s memories of what it was like to photograph these people. But we’ve also included, below, a few of the longer and often hilarious stories Bill Ray told about documenting the lives and careers of the 20th century’s most famous public figures.

[Buy Bill Ray’s My LIFE in Photography, from which some of these memories, slightly edited, are taken.]

Marilyn Monroe Sings “Happy Birthday” to JFK, May 19, 1962:

I was on assignment for LIFE at the old Madison Square Garden that night one of many photographers down in front of the stage. The police, with directions from the Secret Service, were forcing the press into a tight group behind a rope. I knew that all the “rope-a-dopes” would get the same shot, and that would not work for LIFE. I squeezed between the cops and took off looking for a better place.

It seemed that I climbed forever. When I found a pipe railing to rest the lens on (exposure was strictly by guess), I could see JFK through the telephoto. When the moment came, the Garden went black. Total silence.

One spotlight snapped on, and there was Marilyn, in that dress, crystals sparkling and flashing. She was smiling, with everyone on the edge of their seats. Then, in her breathy, sexy, unique voice, looking the entire time right at JFK, she sang.

In two-and-a-half months, Marilyn would be dead. In eighteen months, Kennedy would be assassinated; Vietnam would turn into our worst nightmare; Camelot would be gone. But that night, Marilyn’s brief song stopped the world.

Brigitte Bardot Throws a Tantrum on the Set of Shalako, Spain, 1968:

I rode with Bardot to the set many times in her white Rolls-Royce. On one of those mornings, B.B. saw a stray, starving dog and ordered her driver to stop. It was love at first sight. The starving mutt loved B.B. and the Rolls, and B.B. loved the mutt. B.B. put all her retainers on the case. She would make a perfect life for this “adorable” dog.

Her hairdresser bathed the dog. Her chauffeur tore off in the Rolls for filet mignon. The dog never left her side until the fourth day when he keeled over dead from too much of the good life.

B.B. started to cry and worked herself up to uncontrollable wailing. She locked her dressing room door. Cast and crew [including co-star Sean Connery] were standing by. Lunch time came and went. The wailing went on and on. The whole day was lost; mucho dinero.

Woody Allen in Vegas, 1966:

It was a pivotal year for Woody. He published stories in the New Yorker, wrote and directed his first film, What’s Up Tiger Lily? and had a Broadway hit, Don’t Drink the Water. He was on fire, and LIFE wanted to celebrate him with a cover story. I was given the job of shooting Woody in Las Vegas, along with any other photos I could get of his other activities.

The Woody I met at Caesars Palace was one of the quietest, most cooperative people I’ve ever worked with. The only problem was that he didn’t do anything except stay in his room, write, and practice his clarinet until it was time for his standup routine. Then I remembered the kitschy nude Roman statues in front of Caesars. With trepidation, I asked Woody if he would pose with one of the nudes. He thought it was a funny idea and said “sure.” That was a relief and I pressed my luck, asking him if he would wear a red sweater that I happened to have with me.

“Is it cashmere?” he asked. It wasn’t; it was wool.

Woody said he was allergic to wool, but after some pleading, he agreed to wear it.

I needed the contrast with the white statue, and a bit of red never hurt for a cover shoot. The statue seemed to inspire Woody, and he really came to life. He hugged and vamped and swung around. It was tremendous fun.

Phone calls and telexes from New York assured me the shots were great and would run with the story.

But LIFE was a weekly and would use a news cover whenever they could. Unfortunately for me, some damn thing happened that week and LIFE scrapped the Woody Allen cover. It was heartbreaking but I still had the great thrill of working with one on the comic geniuses of my time.