Page 19 – LIFE

Remembering Francoise Gilot, Artist and Picasso’s Lover

June 8, 2023June 8, 2023 by Bill Syken

Francoise Gilot, who died on June 6, 2023 at the age of 101, led an astounding life. A highly regarded artist in her own right, she is inevitably—and perhaps unfairly—best known for her relationship with Pablo Picasso. They were together from 1943 to 1953, and they had two children together, Claude and Paloma. In 1964 Gilot published a popular and unflattering memoir of her life with Picasso that the artist unsuccessfully attempted to quash. A sign of the tumultuousness of their relationship is that there was a 1996 movie about it titled Surviving Picasso.

In 1970 she went on to marry Jonas Salk, inventor of the polio vaccine (this gallery includes an image of him as photographed by LIFE’s Alfred Eisenstaedt). Gilot and Salk were together until his death in 1995. When asked how she ended up in relationships with two of the most important figures of the 20th century, she explained, “Lions mate with lions.”

It was due to her proximity to Picasso that Gilot appeared before LIFE’s cameras. She was a presence in a 1968 double-issue of the magazine devoted entirely to Picasso. And she was also photographed by LIFE staff photographer Gjon Mili, who took perhaps the most famous photographs of Picasso, which featured the great artist drawing with light.

Gilot also drew with light—and to great effect—in one of Mili’s photos of her. Mili also took a beguiling portrait of Gilot using the multiple exposures he had deployed throughout his career. Other photos show Gilot holding Picasso’s drawings of her son Claude while the young boy sat in the foreground.

In 2021 her painting Paloma à la Guitare sold for $1.3 million at auction, a sign of the esteem in which her own work is held. If you wish to read more about Gilot, please visit this site devoted to her life and works.

A multiple-exposure portrait of Francoise Gilot, mistress of artist Pablo Picasso, Vallauris, France, 1949.

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Portrait of Francoise Gilot holding red gladiola, 1949.

.Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Francoise Gilot drawing with light, Vallauris, France, 1949.

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Francoise Gilot with her young son Claude, holding drawings of the boy by his father, Picasso, 1949.

Gjon Mili/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Pablo Picasso casually carved a figure in space, 1949.

Gjon Mili The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Doctor Jonas Salk holding a syringe in the laboratory, Pittsburgh, 1953.

Alfred Eisenstaedt/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An All-Night Prom at Disneyland, 1961

June 19, 2023June 6, 2023 by Bill Syken

When Disneyland opened in California in 1955 after years of design from Walt Disney, LIFE magazine proclaimed it “the stuff children’s dreams are made on.”

Six years later both the park and the dreamers had grown up enough that Disneyland decided to host an event aimed at kids who might be outgrowing their mouse ears: an all-night prom.

The details of the evening are scant because the photos, taken by staff photographers Ralph Crane, J.R. Eyerman and Grey Villet, never ran in the magazine. But one thing is clear: the kids had a blast. With the spinning teacups, water rides, a big band, and romance in the air (and on display for some of the couples, especially on the carousel) all the elements were there for a magical night in the magic kingdom.

Take a look and see for yourself. And if you want to read more about the creation of Disneyland, please consider LIFE’s special tribute issue Inside Disney Parks: The Happiest Place on Earth.

Students walking inside Disneyland during their all-prom-night, United States, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

People attending the all-night prom at Disneyland, Anaheim, California, June 1961

J.R. Eyerman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

People attending the all-night prom at Disneyland, Anaheim, California, June 1961.

J.R. Eyerman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night prom at Disneyland, Anaheim, California, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Students getting their prom pictures during All Night Prom at Disneyland – Photographs of an all-night high school prom held at Disney Land

People riding the carousel during all night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night high school prom held at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all night high school prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night prom at Disneyland, Anaheim, California, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night high school prom held at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

People riding a gondola boat during an all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Students participating in a high school all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

J.R. Eyerman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night high school prom held at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Band playing at an all-night prom at Disneyland, Anaheim, California, June 1961.

J.R. Eyerman/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night high school prom held at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Teenage boys sit at cafe tables outside of Tomorrowland during an all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Ralph Crane/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

An all-night prom at Disneyland, 1961.

Grey Villet/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

When D-Day Was Breaking News

June 2, 2023June 2, 2023 by Bill Syken

On June 6, 1944, the U.S. military and its allies launched a massive attack in Nazi-occupied northern France. More than 160,000 allied soldiers landed in Normandy in the largest amphibious assault in history, and 9,000 allied soldiers were killed or wounded in the first 24 hours of the invasion. The cost was great, but the moment stands as one of triumph because it began to turn the tide of World War II and led to the defeat of Adolph Hitler.

The invasion, which had been planned for more than a year, was obviously massive news, and D-Day and its aftermath was covered extensively in LIFE. Look at the June 12, 1944 issue and the the June 19, 1944 and you will find photos and reporting that goes for pages and pages. On this site you can see photo stories about England and France in the days before and after the invasion, a visual chronicle of the fighting that followed D-Day, and Omar Bradley’s return to Omaha Beach 25 years later.

Here we look at photos which show how the immediate news of the invasion spread. In one photo citizens read printed reports hung in the window of a Chicago radio station. In another workers at a manufacturing plant stop work to hear the historic announcement read to them. And then there are the newspaper readers, gathering to buy copies in Chicago in one photo, and in another reading about the assault in France on park benches in Los Angeles. Another photo shows British pilots in training, reading the newspaper to learn about the latest about the war they would soon be fighting in.

Today if such an invasion happened we would be planted in front of our preferred news channel or social media stream, getting battle updates by the second. But look at the faces of the people hearing the news back in 1944; the reports, however archaic the means of delivery, still land with that sense of immediacy. It’s another way of feeling the importance of the massive and bloody military operation that proved to be a swivel moment in the history of the 20th century.

A group of men read bulletins of the Normandy invasion posted in the window of the news booth of radio station WBBM, Chicago, June 1944.

Gordon Coster/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Workers at a manufacturing plant stop for a moment of prayer following announcement of the Allied invasion of Europe, aka D-Day.

Wallace Kirkland/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

People gather around a newspaper stand to purchase copies of the Chicago Daily News and the Chicago Daily Tribune, both of which report on D-Day, the former with the headline ‘Invasion On: 4,000 Ships Hit Coast’ and the latter with the headline ‘Allies Invade France,’ Chicago, June 6, 1944.

Gordon Coster/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

People reading newspapers with the headlines of the D-Day invasion at the Pershing Square Park, Los Angeles, June 6, 1944.

John Florea/Life Picture Collecrtion/Shutterstock

British pilots training at Falcon Field read a newspaper account of the D-Day Allied invasion of France.

Sgt. James Burns/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The Original Vacation Spot

May 30, 2023May 30, 2023 by Bill Syken

Lake George, N.Y. makes an unusual claim to fame: it touts itself as the America’s original vacation spot.

The basis of that claim? In 1869 a Boston preacher named William H.H. Murray published his popular book Adventures in the Wilderness, or Camp-Life in the Adirondacks, which was a mix of fiction and travel brochure touting the wonders of outdoor life in Lake George. And readers started coming there for getaways, inspired by the idea that the wilds of nature were to be enjoyed rather than merely navigated or avoided. According to an article in Smithsonian about Lake George, the people who ventured there that first summer didn’t enjoy it much because they were often unprepared for outdoor life and the weather that year was unusually cold and rainy. (Sounds like a classic vacation). But in subsequent years the weather was better and Lake George flourished as a tourist destination.

That history may help explain why LIFE photographer Nina Leen went to Lake George in 1941 to photograph a young couple enjoying a weekend in nature. The pictures are indeed stunning, particularly the one titled “Private Island,” which shows the couple sitting together on a small outcropping in the middle of a placid lake. The photo makes Lake George look like a kind of Eden. (It should be noted that the same spot looks more ordinary in other photos taken by Leen— the rock the couple is sitting on is just a few steps from the shore—but as every amateur photographer knows, when crafting that perfect vacation photo, angles are everything).

LIFE never ran Leen’s story on Lake George—one imagines it might have been bumped for news about the gathering storm that was World War II. So we don’t know much about the young man and woman in the photos: their ages, occupations, marital status, or where they arrived from. That’s fine. Their anonymity allows them become a symbolic Adam and Eve, making their way back for a couple days in paradise.

A young couple vacationing at Lake George, New York.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A young couple vacationing at Lake George, New York, 1941.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A couple vacationing at Lake George, New York, 1941.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A young couple enjoyed a Lake George vacation in a Nina Leen photo entitled “Private Island,” 1941.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A couple vacationing at Lake George, New York, 1941.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A couple vacationing at Lake George, New York, 1941.

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A couple vacationing at Lake George, New York, 1941.

Nina Leen/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

When Dad Tried Doing Mom’s Work For a Weekend

May 23, 2023May 23, 2023 by Bill Syken

Household roles have changed a lot since LIFE’s original run as a magazine, from 1936 to 1972. In April 2023 the Pew Research Center released a study which showed that in an increasing number of marriages, women earn about the same or more than their husbands, and the number of households in which the female is the primary earner has tripled over the last 50 years.

But despite their increased earning power, women are still more likely to carry the heavier burden when it comes to parenting. That context is all worth keeping in mind when considering a photo essay that ran the July 16, 1956 issue of LIFE. The story followed around a father who—brace yourself—had to take care of his four children by himself for an entire weekend while his wife was away.

The photo essay may have been built around a now-outdated assumption about the father’s role in the household, but it at least recognized the value of the unpaid labor that mothers have done for ages. The lighthearted essay by LIFE photographer Joe Scherschel showed how much dad struggled when he had to take over the work his wife had been doing.

The dad in question was Joe Gordon, a 33-year-old architect in Dallas. His four kids included Laura Lea (9 years old), Spencer (3), and a pair of two-month-old twin boys. Joe was on his own for the weekend because his wife had gone to her parents in Tulsa for some much-needed rest.

As the pictures show, Joe had to face the usual mayhem of parenting—crying children, diaper changes, early wake-ups, a sink full of dishes, and the inexplicable random crisis (why is Spencer playing with nails in the hallway?) The photos feel like they could be stills from a 1950s sitcom.

And at the end of this episode Joe learned the valuable lesson about domestic labor. He told LIFE after his weekend with the kids, “I feel like I’ve been on a 25-mile hike with a full pack…I wouldn’t change jobs on a bet.”

Jo Lea said goodbye to her husband, Joe Gordon, and her two-month-old twins, before a weekend away, 1956. LIFE followed Joe for a photo essay as he cared for his four children on his own.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, in the first hours of his weekend vigil, managing the simultaneous feeding of his two-month old twins, from a story on the adventures of a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, holding one of the twins while talking on the phone with mom, from a 1956 photo essay on the adventures of a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, with twins on his shoulders, is ready for sleep and heading for the bedroom; from a 1956 story on the adventures of a father of four children whose mother was away on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, changing one twin with the other on his shoulder, from a 1956 story on the adventures of a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, relaxing for a few minutes on the bed next to one twin that is sleeping, from a 1956 photo essay on the adventures of a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, trying to grab a bite to eat before bringing in the wash, and at the same time, trying to keep his two-month-old son quiet, from a photo essay on the adventures of a father with four children and their mother away on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, changing the twins, from a 1956 photo essay on the adventures of a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, with one of his twins during a five a.m. feeding, from a 1956 photo essay on the adventures of a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, holding his two babies, trying to get a drink, from a 1956 photo essay on the adventures of a father a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon clumsily lifting infant son Clark while attempting to change his diaper, from a 1956 photo essay on a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon surveying the lineup of dirty dishes and formula bottles (he finally did the dishes at 11 o’clock that night), from a 1956 photo essay on the adventures of a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Last-minute crisis for Joe Gordon, as son Spencer Gordon plays with a pile of nails he spilled on the hallway floor, from a 1956 photo essay on the adventures of a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon, preparing his daughter Laura Lea for Sunday school class, from a 1956 story on the adventures of a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Joe Gordon holding crown which came off his tooth while eating steak, from a 1956 story on a father taking over child care duties while his wife is on vacation.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Mother returns home at last after a weekend away, greeting her weary husband, Joe Gordon, and the kids, 1956.

Joe Scherschel/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Historic Graduation at Little Rock Central High

May 19, 2023May 19, 2023 by Bill Syken

Little Rock Central High School lives in American history as one of the landmark battlegrounds of the civil rights movement. President Dwight D. Eisenhower called in the national guard after the nine black students chosen to integrate Little Rock Central following the Supreme Court’s ruling in Brown vs. Board of Education were initially barred from entering. LIFE’s coverage of their first day of school produced some of the most memorable photos in the history of the magazine.

That was in the fall of 1957. In May 1958, LIFE photographer Grey Villet came back to Arkansas when Ernest Green was set to become the first black student to graduate from Little Rock Central.

Villet’s photos capture a day that had some of the familiar elements of graduation—the gathering of friends and family and the pride of a moment of achievement. But other images mark it as a moment in history. Martin Luther King Jr. was there (he would sit with Green’s family during graduation and go largely unnoticed), and national guard troops were also on hand to safeguard the ceremony. Then there are Villet’s shots which show Green as the lone black face among crowds of white students, which hints at the reality Green and the rest of the Little Rock Nine faced on a daily basis.

“It’s been an interesting year. I’ve had a course in human relations firsthand.” That was Green’s brief comment in the story that ran in LIFE on his graduation.

That assessment was, obviously, an understatement, as Green and the other members of the Little Rock Nine endured harassment from white students throughout the school year. As an adult, Green gave a lengthy interview about Little Rock Central which is available at the American Archive of Public Broadcasting. In it he said “I think there is no question that the nine of us thought that the sacrifice we were doing was worth it, and if having to do it over again, I would do it the same way.”

He also detailed the drama of graduation day, from the down-to-the-wire question of whether he would pass physics to the anxiety he felt walking across the stage for his diploma:

I had been there nine months and had thought that all I needed to do was to graduate, just get out of there, and that it would be impossible for white people to say that nobody black had ever graduated from Central High School. So the graduation was in May. I was having difficulty with one course, it was a physics course, and almost up to the last minute didn’t know whether I was going to complete it successfully so that I would be able to, to get out of there, but as things were, I got a fairly decent grade out of it. And at the graduation ceremony, one of the guests was Martin Luther King. He was speaking in Pine Bluff, Arkansas AM&N, at the black college there, and came up to sit with my mother, and Mrs. Bates [Daisy Bates, the president of the Arkansas NAACP], and a couple of other friends in the audience. And all I could think of, there were six hundred and some odd students graduating that night, it was in the stadium, the place was packed, cameras, lights, to record this event, and I said, now, I can’t walk across this stage and stumble. [laughs] And all I figured that I had to do was to get up to the principal, take that diploma, and walk off the other end and it would be over. I would have done my duty and been able to have a relaxing summer. Because it really wasn’t, certainly wasn’t the way to go to go to school under that kind of pressure.

Green, a former Eagle Scout, did make it across that stage despite his nerves, and from there he continued his education at Michigan State, where he earned a bachelor’s and master’s degrees. He would go on to serve as the U.S. Assistant Secretary of Labor under Jimmy Carter.

In 1993 Green’s life was dramatized in Disney’s made-for-TV movie The Ernest Green Story, in which he was portrayed by Morris Chestnut. That film, by the way, had its premiere at Little Rock Central High School.

Ernest Green, one of the Little Rock Nine, on the day of his graduation from Little Rock Central, 1958.

Grey Villet/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ernest Green with his mother on the day he became the first black student to graduate from Little Rock Central, 1958.

Grey Villet/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ernest Green, the first black student to graduate from Little Rock Central, at home with his graduation gifts, 1958.

Grey Villet/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ernest Green, the first black student to graduate from Little Rock Central, on his graduation day, May 1958.

Grey Villet/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ernest Green, one of the Little Rock Nine, became the first black student to graduate from Little Rock Central, 1958.

Grey Villet/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The national guard was on hand at for the graduation ceremony at Little Rock Central that included Ernest Green, the first black student to graduate from the school, 1958.

Grey Villet/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Ernest Green, the first black student to graduate from Little Rock Central, on his graduation day, 1958.

Grey Villet/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock

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The Original Vacation Spot

When Dad Tried Doing Mom’s Work For a Weekend

A Historic Graduation at Little Rock Central High

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