May 2014 - Page 3 of 5

Dean Martin: Rare and Classic Photos of a Laid-Back Legend

December 30, 2019May 22, 2014 by

In the early- to mid-1960s, Dean Martin emerged as one of the most popular entertainers on the planet. He starred in major films, knocked the Beatles off the top of the charts with what would become his trademark tune, “Everybody Loves Somebody,” defined a new genre of cool with Frank Sinatra and the rest of the Rat Pack, and captained his own long-running TV variety show. He did all of it with the air of a man who had just woken from a nap and was still charmingly groggy.

In 1958 when the pictures in this gallery were made, Dino—while famous as one-half of the Martin & Lewis comedy duo—had not yet crossed over into superstardom. But he was certainly enough of a draw that LIFE magazine devoted a photo-filled seven-page feature to the man they dubbed “Make-a-Million Martin.”

[To] his skillfully used musical and comedy talents, he adds an ebullience that pervades everything he does. . . . Uninhibited, spry of mind and muscle, he maintains a state of relaxation that “makes Perry Como look like a nervous wreck.”

Keeping carefree appears to be the common denominator of the many Martins — showman, businessman, prankster, family man, self-styled hell-raiser and Hollywood social lion. In each role he works hard at making hard work look easy.

Here LIFE pays tribute to one of show business’ enduring, and most laid-back, superstars.

Dean Martin swung a golf club in order to stay loose on the set of the film Some Came Running, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Sammy Davis Jr. visited Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra on the set of Some Came Running, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr., 1958

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin with Shirley MacLaine, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin listened to music at home, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin in the steam room, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

After a steam bath, Dean dined on beef and beer before his Sands act. With him are songsmith Sammy Cahn (seated) and helper Mack Gray.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin, 1958

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin charged onto stage, followed by Frank Sinatra, at a performance by Judy Garland. To make amends for heckling Garland from the audience, they contributed their talents to the show.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin on stage, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin, 1958

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin, Judy Garland and Frank Sinatra, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin hosted a dinner at his Hollywood Dino’s Lodge restaurant. The menu before guest Edith Adams had been altered by her husband, TV’s Ernie Kovacs.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin advised Jimmy Van Huesen (foreground), Johnny Grant (left), Leo and Mrs. Durocher that the dinner would be “on separate checks.”

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin took a turn running a Sands roulette wheel. He pushed chips to a winner, telling her, “Either take it or get out of here.”

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin signed autographs, Las Vegas, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin with his wife, Jeanne, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin at home with his wife, Jeanne, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean inspected his daughter Claudia’s hair. ‘Comb it with a broom?” he asked.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Young Dino flexed for his father, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Pop’s perplexity was registered as Gina strolled pensively in shoes large enough for two.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin at home, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Poker pals at Martin’s home included (clockwise from Dean at left) agent Jerry Gershwin, Tony Curtis, Milton Berle, Ernie Kovacs with 85-cent cigar, and director Billy Wilder.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin gave his son Dino a kiss and a dish of ice cream. “Eat it, it comes on the dinner,” said Dean.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A Milton Berle joke slayed Tony Curtis, Dean Martin, and publicist Warran Cowan. “Show Miltie a curtain, he takes a bow,'” said Dean.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Dean Martin with his wife, Jeanne, at home, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

LIFE magazine, Dec. 22, 1958.

Two-Piece Be With You: In Praise of the Bikini

January 16, 2020May 18, 2014 by

On July 5, 1946, less than a week after the United States detonated an atomic bomb above tiny Bikini Atoll in the South Pacific, a Frenchman named Louis Réard an automobile engineer moonlighting as a fashion designer introduced to the sunbathing public what was billed as the world’s smallest swimsuit. Réard called his creation the bikini a name inspired, he later said, by the sight of women rolling up their bathing suits in order to acquire a more complete tan.

Two-piece swimsuits had, of course, been around for a long, long time before Réard came along. Greek urns and mosaics created more than 3,000 years ago depict women athletes wearing two-piece outfits. But Réard’s genius was to devise a garment, out of as little fabric as possible, that one could still legally wear in public.

He marketed his new fashion brilliantly, as well—pronouncing, for example, that a bathing suit wasn’t a true bikini unless both pieces could be pulled through a wedding ring.

Here, LIFE.com offers a celebration of a bathing staple that, through the years, has enjoyed and endured a dizzying array of permutations while always remaining, unmistakably, itself.

Some of the early photos in this gallery depict two-piece bathing suits that might, at first glance, look like bona fide bikinis—but, in Réard’s eyes, would not fit the bill. After all, can be wearing a genuine bikini if, say, one’s bellybutton is covered by a swath of nylon, no matter how elegant or tasteful that swath might be.

Bikinis are not for everyone. There are, thankfully, as many styles of bathing suit as there are human body types and temperaments. That said, it remains incontestably true that few sights can evoke thoughts of summer’s delights with quite the same visceral punch as the unmistakable silhouette of Monsieur Réard’s ingeniously simple, timeless design.

Model June Pickney, 1960.

Stan Wayman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Actress Linda Christian in 1945.

Bob Landry/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Sunbathing in France, 1945.

Ralph Morse/ Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Actress Dona Drake playfully took aim with a rifle on the balcony of her Los Angeles home, 1942.

Peter Stackpole/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Model Lynn Jones, 1955.

Peter Stackpole/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

French actress Barbara Lange in a makeshift two-piece bathing suit she cut from one yard of cloth, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Santa Monica, Calif., 1940.

Peter Stackpole/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

This sun bather had creative tattoos, 1941.

Peter Stackpole/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Rita Hayworth at home in Los Angeles, 1945.

Peter Stackpole/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Florida, 1945.

Nina Leen/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Sunbathing in France, 1945.

Ralph Morse/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Beauty pageant winner Jackie Lee Barnes posed poolside in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1949.

Ed Clark/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Model in a bikini, 1950.

Ed Clark/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

French fashion model Christiane Richard wore a bikini while drinking her morning coffee, 1950.

Nat Farbman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Jayne Mansfield posed with hot-water bottle likenesses floating around her, 1957.

Allan Grant/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Jayne Mansfield and unidentified man, 1961.

Stan Wayman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Skin diving in Israel, 1960.

Paul Schutzer/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Sunbathing, 1961.

Allan Grant/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Actress Philomene Toulouse, cradling a pet fox, vied for attention at the Cannes film festival, 1962.

Paul Schutzer/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Cannes, France, 1962.

Paul Schutzer/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Atlantic City, New Jersey, 1964.

Art Rickerby/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Hungarian model, 1965.

Walter Sanders/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Model Naty Abascal showed off designs on her chest and stomach, Bahamas, 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Near Malibu, California, 1970.

Co Rentmeester/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Southern California, 1970.

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Alone in a Crowd: Marilyn Sings ‘Happy Birthday’ to JFK, May 19, 1962

December 16, 2019May 18, 2014 by

You can’t see her face. The angle from which the photograph is taken is unconventional, and almost vertiginous. The hair, when considered dispassionately, looks absolutely weird.

But Bill Ray’s celebrated picture of Marilyn Monroe onstage at the old Madison Square Garden, singing “Happy Birthday” to President John F. Kennedy during a May 1962 birthday gala in his honor, remains one of the all-time great celebrity portraits. It has drama (a lone figure, spotlit, on a dark stage). It has sex (a skintight, sequined dress that conceals very, very little). And, of course, in retrospect, it also feels absolutely charged with pathos: Marilyn, after all, would be dead within months of the picture being made, while JFK’s assassination in November 1963 was less than a year and half away.

But like all pictures that assume a stature and a celebrity of their own, far beyond what the photographer could possibly have hoped for or even imagined at the time he or she made the shot, Ray’s photograph is more than a mere portrait. In its stark, almost severe black-and-white simplicity a female figure, a few sheets of paper, a rather battered old wooden lectern, all surrounded by an impenetrable black void the image of Marilyn Monroe seems to capture not only a celebration, but the 35-year-old movie star’s loneliness; her desperate need for affection and affirmation; and the isolating, withering effects of fame on those souls unprepared for its unblinking gaze.

Visit BillRay.com to purchase prints to see more of Bill’s remarkable photographs.

Marilyn Monroe 1962 by Bill Ray

© Bill Ray

Behind the Picture: RFK’s Assassination, Los Angeles, 1968

December 30, 2019May 15, 2014 by

How many times must we live through these throat-paralyzing sequences of days of gun play, grief and muffled drums?

That question, posed by LIFE magazine in its June 14, 1968, issue, is freighted with all of the emotions—sorrow, frustration, a bewildered dread—unleashed by the events that unsettled the country in the first half of that schizoid year. The assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.; the Tet Offensive, the My Lai massacre and the other horrors of the war in Vietnam; and, in early June, the murder of Robert Kennedy by a Jerusalem-born Palestinian Christian, Sirhan Sirhan, in the kitchen of the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles.

Here, remembering RFK’s assassination—a murder that came just as Kennedy was finding his true voice as the leader of a vast, disaffected cross-section of the American public—LIFE.com presents a series of photos by the great Bill Eppridge. Many of these photos never ran in LIFE.

The very first picture in the gallery is not only the most recognized and most frequently reproduced picture from the night of the assassination, but one of the most chilling, signature images of the 1960s. As a historical document, it’s indispensable. As a photograph, it’s astonishing: made in an instant, Eppridge’s picture possesses the immediacy of great photojournalism, while conveying a totemic sense in its interplay of light and dark. It’s reminiscent of a tone sometimes encountered in portraits by the Old Masters.

Wrote LIFE in that issue after RFK’s murder:

The nation in less than six years has watched the violent deaths of two Kennedys and a King. If Robert Kennedy, a complex man, ambitious and fatalistic, did not inspire so universal an admiration as his brother, he had shown himself capable of growing and deepening. He died too young; the Kennedy family has paid dearly for its ardor for public service.

Almost instinctive in the recoil at his murder was the sense that it was a part of a climate of violence. Arthur Schlesinger [JFK’s “court historian”] may have been speaking more in the moment than as a historian when he said last week “we are today the most frightening people on this planet.” Even if he is a Pasadena resident, a Jordanian Arab [RFK’s assassin, Sirhan] who kills out of a hatred for his ancient enemy, the Jews, may be a better example of classic Middle Eastern methods than of the callous kook our mixed-media society is accused of turning on and turning loose.

President Johnson was right when he said, “Two hundred million Americans did not strike down Robert Kennedy. . . .” But it is surely a good thing to ask ourselves whether the compulsion to violence was born entirely within a killer or whether we and our society are somehow accomplices. . . . The Vietnam war has been our most vivid daily exposure to violence — and the nation’s eagerness to stop it comes less from any political reappraisal of the ends than a moral revulsion at the means: we don’t love violence all that much.

In the decades since LIFE expressed those sentiments, millions of words have been written about the Kennedys and, specifically, about the abiding intensity with which Lyndon Johnson and Robert Kennedy despised one another. The two men had essentially been enemies since Johnson accepted JFK’s invitation to be his running mate, a decision Bobby Kennedy vocally fought until, and beyond, the 1960 Democratic convention. But in early June 1968, it was still possible for most Americans to believe that President Johnson might, in fact, genuinely mourn the loss of the dynamic if chimerical and often arrogant Robert Kennedy.

The photographs that Bill Eppridge made before, during and after RFK’s assassination don’t require that we forget all we’ve learned about the dank underside of American politics in order to appreciate the fear, rage and anguish sparked by Kennedy’s death. On the contrary, the pictures in this gallery suggest that despite how ambitious and even cruel he could sometimes be, Bobby Kennedy obviously inspired, in countless people, the better angels of their nature.

(One person whose better angels were clearly not stirred was Sirhan Sirhan, who said he murdered Bobby Kennedy because Kennedy supported Israel; or maybe because he, Sirhan, was drunk and murderously furious on the one-year anniversary of the beginning of the Six-Day War in the Middle East; or perhaps, as he later claimed, because he was brainwashed . . . take your pick. Sirhan’s stated reasons for pumping three bullets into Bobby Kennedy and injuring several other people that night have varied wildly through the years.)

Would Robert Kennedy have won the Democratic nomination if Sirhan had not gunned him down in that hotel kitchen? Would he have gone on to beat Richard Nixon in the general election if he had won the nomination? The measure of the man must be taken not by what he might have done, but by what he said and did during his lifetime.

“A complex man, ambitious and fatalistic,” LIFE wrote of Kennedy, who had “shown himself capable of growing and deepening.” We’ll never know how much he might have grown, how much further he might have deepened, had Sirhan’s bullets not silenced him.That’s where much of the tragedy of the tale lies: in the ruined promise of the man’s potential.

Rigid, semiconscious, his face an ashen mask, Senator Kennedy lay in a pool of his own blood on the concrete floor, a bullet deep in his brain and another in his neck. Juan Romero, a busboy whose hand Kennedy had shaken before the shots, tried to comfort him.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Robert Kennedy, June, 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Sen. Robert Kennedy campaigned, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Robert Kennedy, June 1968.

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Supporters of presidential candidate Robert Kennedy watched him on TV.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Sen. Robert Kennedy conferred with an aide during his run for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Sen. Robert Kennedy gave a speech at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles before his assassination, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Headed for his victory speech in the Ambassador Hotel ballroom, Robert Kennedy stopped in the kitchen to shake hands. A few minutes later the gunman was waiting for him in the corridor just outside the kitchen.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Robert Kennedy stopped in the kitchen to shake hands.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Robert Kennedy greeted supporters not long before his assassination, June 5, 1968, Los Angeles, Calif.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

A less-famous image of Sen. Robert Kennedy and Ambassador Hotel employee Juan Romero moments after RFK was shot by Sirhan Sirhan, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

A mortally wounded Robert Kennedy on the floor of the kitchen at the Ambassador Hotel, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

In the hot, jammed corridor where her husband lay behind her, Ethel Kennedy implored the crowd of shocked onlookers to move back and give him some air.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

A wounded Paul Schrade, a regional director of the United Auto Workers Union, labor chair of Robert Kennedy’s campaign and one of five other people shot by Sirhan Sirhan, lay on the floor of the kitchen at the Ambassador Hotel, June 5, 1968.

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A mortally wounded Robert Kennedy on the floor of the kitchen at the Ambassador Hotel, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Robert Kennedy assassination, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Ethel Kennedy and others surrounded Robert Kennedy in the kitchen at the Ambassador Hotel, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Ethel Kennedy and others surrounded a mortally wounded Robert Kennedy in the kitchen at the Ambassador Hotel, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Ethel Kennedy, who had been walking beside him, crouched over her dying husband, whispering to him as he lay on the floor. Beside Ethel, waiting for the ambulance attendants to arrive, knelt her sister-in-law, Mrs. Stephen Smith and Dr. Ross Miller.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

A Robert Kennedy supporter registered disbelief after his shooting.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

The scene at the Hospital of the Good Samaritan in Los Angeles after Robert Kennedy arrived there, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Robert F. Kennedy assassination, June 5, 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

A young Robert Kennedy supporter showed disbelief after Kennedy was shot by Sirhan Sirhan, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

The football great, and RFK bodyguard, Rosey Grier arrived at the hospital. Grier had tackled Sirhan at the scene after Sirhan shot RFK; George Plimpton walked behind Grier.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

At the Hospital of the Good Samaritan in Los Angeles.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

The scene at the Hospital of the Good Samaritan in Los Angeles after Robert Kennedy arrived there, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

The scene at the Hospital of the Good Samaritan in Los Angeles, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/ Life Pictures/Shutterstock

An aide to Sen. Robert Kennedy, Frank Mankiewicz (center, in suit and tie), prepared to address the media gathered outside the Hospital of the Good Samaritan, Los Angeles, June 5, 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Edward Kennedy’s wife Joan Bennett Kennedy (left), Jackie Kennedy (center) and Sargent Shriver (right), husband of Eunice Kennedy and brother-in-law to John, Robert and Edward Kennedy, after the assassination of RFK, Los Angeles, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Robert Kennedy’s body was loaded into a transport after his death and autopsy, prior to being shipped from Los Angeles to New York, June 6, 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

Following a funeral mass at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City, RFK’s body traveled by train to Washington, DC, where he was buried near his older brother John. In this photo, people paid respects to the slain senator as the train carrying his body passed by, June 1968.

Bill Eppridge/Life Pictures/Shutterstock

After ‘Brown v. Board of Education’: Portraits of Integration, Virginia, 1959

February 22, 2022May 15, 2014 by

The United States Supreme Court landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision in 1954 that declared “separate educational facilities are inherently unequal,” setting the stage for the desegregation of all of America’s public schools. But integration didn’t happen overnight. In fact, in many places around the country, it took years.

The most often cited and arguably the most memorable integration battle took place in 1957, in Arkansas, when the Little Rock Nine entered high school—after President Dwight Eisenhower federalized the Arkansas National Guard and, incredibly, sent in troops from the storied 101st Airborne to ensure the teens’ safety. But the drama and tension so evident in Little Rock also played out—albeit with less firepower on hand—in schools around the country for years after Brown v. Board of Education.

Here, LIFE.com remembers one of those post-Little Rock battles: the integration of high schools in Virginia five long years after the Supreme Court’s unanimous ruling. In February 1959, the state’s governor, J. Lindsay Almond, reluctantly abandoned his carefully choreographed “massive resistance” to integration—including the closing of schools and keeping thousands of kids out of class in an attempt to forestall desegregation. Shortly thereafter, 21 African-American students began attending classes in Norfolk and Arlington. LIFE photographers Paul Schutzer and Ed Clark were there, in Norfolk, when 17 of those students made history.

LIFE’s coverage of the integration of the Norfolk schools painted a relatively rosy picture of what the magazine called the “calm and hopeful integration start” in Virginia.

“The peaceful transition,” LIFE wrote in its Feb. 16, 1959, issue, “went a long way to restore the climate of inevitability of integration in the South, which had been badly disturbed a year and half ago by violence and diehard defiance in Little Rock.” (That same issue of LIFE, unfortunately, also repeatedly misidentified one of the Norfolk students, 15-year-old Louis Cousins, as “Lewis” Cousins.)

Despite LIFE’s optimistic characterization of the “peaceful transition,” it’s worth noting that many of the students later recalled their experiences as hurtful, isolating and confusing, even if they kept up a brave front for the cameras — and, perhaps more importantly, for their white peers.

All these years later, their courage still astounds.

Seventeen of the African American students who were ordered admitted to white schools in Norfolk, Va., posed for a photo at a church where they had been getting private schooling, 1959. Upper row: Andrew Heidelberg, Louis Cousins, Patricia Godbolt, Carol Wellington, Reginald Young, Freddy Gonsouland, Edward Jordan, Olivia Driver; lower row: Betty Jean Reed, Johnnie Rouse, Delores Johnson, LaVera Forbes, James Turner Jr., Lolita Portis, Patricia Turner, Claudia Wellington, Geraldine Talley.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Betty Jean Reed was the only black student at Granby High School in Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Betty Jean Reed, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Alone in line, Betty Jean Reed tensely waited for lunch at Granby High cafeteria as other students ignored her.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Betty Jean Reed, Granby High School, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Betty Jean Reed talked on the phone with a friend during her first week as the only African American student at Granby High School, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Betty Jean Reed studied at home, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Granby High School student Betty Jean Reed and her mother, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Six of the “Norfolk 17” students who integrated Virginia schools in 1959: Lower row: LaVera Forbes, Freddy Gonsouland, Johnnie Rouse; upper row: Lolita Portis, James Turner Jr., Claudia Wellington.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Journalists covered the desegregation of Norfolk schools, 1959.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Desegregation of Norfolk, Va., public school, 1959.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Desegregation of Norfolk, Va., public school, 1959. Students: Olivia Driver, Freddy Gonsouland.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Three of the “Norfolk 17” students who integrated Virginia schools in 1959: (left to right) Delores Johnson, Reginald Young, Carol Wellington.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Patricia Godbolt ate lunch alone, Norview High School, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Journalists covered the desegregation of Norfolk schools, 1959.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Desegregation of Norfolk, Va., public school, 1959. Students: Freddy Gonsouland, Patricia Godbolt.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Six of the “Norfolk 17” students who integrated Virginia schools in 1959: Lower row: Patricia Godbolt, Andrew Heidelberg, Olivia Driver; upper row: Geraldine Talley, Edward Jordan, Patricia Turner.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fifteen-year-old Louis Cousins, the only black student to attend Maury High School, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fifteen-year-old Louis Cousins, Maury High School, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Louis Cousins ordered lunch in cafeteria at newly desegregated Maury High School, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

A white student stopped to speak with Louis Cousins at newly desegregated Maury High School, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Fifteen-year-old Louis Cousins, the only black student to attend Maury High School, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Alveraze “Freddy” Gonsouland (hand on cheek) at home with his half-brother and mother, Norfolk, Va., 1959.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

At home, integrated pupils Alveraze Gonsouland and half-brother tossed a ball.

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Freddy Gonsouland, reading his Spanish lesson, said he was “studying like never before.”

Ed Clark The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Faces of the American Dead in Vietnam: One Week’s Toll, June 1969

January 17, 2020May 15, 2014 by

In June 1969, LIFE magazine published a feature that remains as moving and, in some quarters, as controversial as it was when it intensified a nation’s soul-searching 45 years ago. On the cover was the image of a young man and 11 stark words: “The Faces of the American Dead in Vietnam: One Week’s Toll.” Inside, across 10 funereal pages, LIFE published picture after picture and name after name of 242 young men killed in seven days halfway around the world “in connection with the conflict in Vietnam.”

To no one’s surprise, the public’s response was immediate, and visceral. Some readers expressed amazement, in light of the thousands of American deaths suffered in a war with no end in sight, that it took so long for LIFE to produce something as dramatic and pointed as “One Week’s Toll.” Others were outraged that the magazine was, as one reader saw it, “supporting the antiwar demonstrators who are traitors to this country.” Still others perhaps the vast majority were quietly and disconsolately devastated.

Here, LIFE.com republishes every picture and every name that originally appeared in that extraordinary 1969 feature. Below is the text, in full, that not only accompanied portraits of those killed, but also explained why LIFE chose to publish “One Week’s Dead” when it did and in the manner that it did.

From the June 27, 1969, issue of LIFE:

The faces shown on the next pages are the faces of American men killed, in the words of the official announcement of their deaths, “in connection with the conflict in Vietnam.” The names, 242 of them, were released on May 28 through June 3 [1969], a span of no special significance except that it includes Memorial Day. The numbers of the dead are average for any seven-day period during this stage of the war.

It is not the intention of this article to speak for the dead. We cannot tell with any precision what they thought of the political currents which drew them across the world. From the letters of some, it is possible to tell they felt strongly that they should be in Vietnam, that they had great sympathy for the Vietnamese people and were appalled at their enormous suffering. Some had voluntarily extended their tours of combat duty; some were desperate to come home. Their families provided most of these photographs, and many expressed their own feelings that their sons and husbands died in a necessary cause. Yet in a time when the numbers of Americans killed in this war—36,000—though far less than the Vietnamese losses, have exceeded the dead in the Korean War, when the nation continues week after week to be numbed by a three-digit statistic which is translated to direct anguish in hundreds of homes all over the country, we must pause to look into the faces. More than we must know how many, we must know who. The faces of one week’s dead, unknown but to families and friends, are suddenly recognized by all in this gallery of young American eyes.

Here are some of the reactions from readers, published in the August 18, 1969, issue of LIFE an issue in which the entire Letters section of the magazine was given over to responses to “One Week’s Dead”:

“Your story was the most eloquent and meaningful statement on the wastefulness and stupidity of war I have ever read.” From a reader in California

“Certainly these tragic young men were far superior to the foreign policy they were called upon to defend.” From a U.S. Marine Corps Captain (resigned)

“I feel you are supporting the antiwar demonstrators who are traitors to this country. You are helping them and therefore belong to this group.” From a reader in Texas

“I cried for those Southern black soldiers. What did they die for? Tar paper shacks, malnutrition, unemployment and degradation?” From a reader in Ohio

“While looking at the photographs I was shocked to see the smiling face of someone I used to know. He was only 19 years old. I guess I never realized that 19-year-olds have to die.” From a reader in Georgia

“I felt I was staring into the eyes of the 11 troopers from my platoon who were killed while fighting for a cause they couldn’t understand.” From a Marine second lieutenant in New Jersey who commanded a rifle platoon in Vietnam

LIFE magazine, June 27, 1969, featuring a portrait of U.S. Army specialist William C. Gearing, Jr., one of 242 American servicemen killed in a single week of fighting during the Vietnam War.

Joseph L. Rhodes, 22, Marines, L. Cpl., Memphis, Tenn.

Life Pictures

Michael C. Volheim, 20, Army, SP4, Hayward, Calif.

Life Pictures

Craig E. Yates, 18, Army, Pfc., Sparta, Mich.

Life Pictures

Ramon L. Vazquez Nieves, 21, Army, Pfc., Puetro Nuevo, P.R.

Life Pictures

Robert E. Layman, 20, Army, WO1, Poquonock, Conn.

Life Pictures

Calvin R. Patrick, 18, Army, Pfc., Houston, Texas

Life Pictures

Valentine Dwornik, 20, Army, SP4, Detroit, Mich.

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Bruce Saunders, 21, Army, 2nd Lt., Queens, N.Y.

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Robert J. Rosenow, 20, Army, Pfc., La Farge, Wis.

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John C. Pape, 25, Army, Capt., Amityville, N.Y.

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William L. Alexander, 19, Army, SP4, Flint, Mich.

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Jose M. Galarza-Quinones, 21, Army, Pfc., Hato Rey, P.R.

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Roy E. Clark, Army, Pfc., Culloden, W. Va.

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James P. Hickey, 19, Marines, Pfc., West Quincy, Mass.

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John L. Rosemond, 21, Army, Pfc., Dallas, Texas

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Mario Lamelza, 21, Army, Pfc., Philadelphia, Pa.

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David Tessmer, 20, Army, Pfc., Wausau, Wis.

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Johnnie L. Brigman, 23, Army, Pvt., North, S.C.

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Gary A. Wallace, 19, Army, Pfc., Louisville, Ky.

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Cleveland Browning, 22, Army, Pfc., Miami, Fla.

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Charles C. Fleek, 21, Army, Sgt., Petersburg, Ky.

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James Patrick Francis, 22, Army, S/Sgt., Napa, Calif.

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Joe E. Bragg, 20, Army, SP4, Versailles, Ky.

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William C. Gearing Jr., 20, Army, SP5, Rochester, N.Y.

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Gary D. Carter, 19, Marines, Cpl., Tyler, Texas

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Matthew T. Lozano Jr., 21, Army, Pfc., San Antonio, Texas

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Winston O. Smith, 24, Army, Pfc., Madisonville, Tenn.

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Robert B. Read, 24, Army, Pfc., Hamden, Conn.

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Mark J. Haverland Jr., 21, Army, Sgt., Poca, W. Va.

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Ralph J. Mears Jr., 19, Army, SP4, Norfolk, Va.

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Philip W. Strout, 21, Army, SP4, So. Portland, Maine

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John A. Gillen, 25, Army, SP4, Broadville, Ill.

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Edward O’Donovan, 19, Marine, Pfc., Chicago, Ill.

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Michael D. Melton, 20, Army, SP4, Little Rock, Ark.

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Melvin Green Jr., 31, Army, S/Sgt., Manhattan, Kan.

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Gary C. Fassel, 20, Army, Pfc., Buffalo, N.Y.

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John W. Kirchner, 19, Marines, Pfc., La Crosse, Wis.

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Keith B. Janke, 26, Army, Sgt., Poplar, Wis.

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William L. Anderson, 18, Army, Sgt., Templeton, Pa.

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David L. Mills, 22, Army, SP4, Decatur, Ill.

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Carl R. Martin, 26, Army, SP5, Rapid City, S. Dak.

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Daniel L. Pucci, 22, Marines, Cpl., Berea, Ohio

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Howe K. Clark Jr., 22, Army, S/Sgt., Rockdale, Texas

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Thomas P. Jackson Jr., 23, Army, Pfc., Westbury, N.Y.

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Clifford Haynes Jr., 19, Marines, Pfc., Carnegie, Pa.

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Scott E. Saylor, 22, Army, SP4, King of Prussia, Pa.

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David R. Mann, 20, Army, SP4, Earlville, Ill.

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Henry R. Hausman Jr., 19, Army, Pfc., Hilliard, Ohio

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Robert J. Randall, 19, Army, Pfc., Miami, Fla.

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David F. Bukowski, 20, Army, SP4, West Islip, N.Y.

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John M. Vollmerhausen Jr., 18, Army, Pfc., Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.

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David A. Hargens, 19, Army, Pfc., Nickerson, Neb.

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Matthew J. Baurle, 20, Marines, L. Cpl., Gloversville, N.Y.

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Richard F. DuBois, 20, Marines, L. Cpl., New Orleans, La.

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Duane C. Bowen, 20, Army, SP4, Ramona, Calif.

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John N. McCarthy, 20, Army, SP4, Glen Cove, N.Y.

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Andrew W. Rice Jr., 20, Navy, GMG3, Bedford, Pa.

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Byrle B. Bailey, 19, Marines, Pfc., Omaha, Neb.

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Charles P. Smith Jr., 20, Army, Pfc., Richmond, Va.

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Robert H. Carter Jr., 35, Army, Lt. Col., Morganton, N.C.

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Stephen L. McCarvel, 19, Army, Sgt., Great Falls, Mont.

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Jackie D. Bass, 21, Army, Pfc., Cochran, Ga.

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William A. Evans, 20, Army, Sgt., Milwaukee, Wis.

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Richard L. Patterson, 25, Army, 2nd Lt., Harriman, Tenn.

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Robert W. Getz, 19, Army, Pfc., Decatur, Ill.

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James Boston Jr., 20, Army, Pfc., Gainesville, Fla.

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Michael F. May, 22, Army, SP4, Vassar, Mich.

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Freddie Lee Coffman, 20, Army, Pfc., Wardensville, W. Va.

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Milton S. Johnson, 20, Army, Pfc., Savannah, Ga.

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Ophrey A. Irvin, 25, Army, SP4, Chillicothe, Ohio

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Thomas W. Myers, 26, Army, Pfc., Middlesex, N.J.

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Gary A. Neavor, 25, Army, SP4, Davenport, Iowa

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Clarance Taylor, 25, Army, Pfc., Greensville, Ala.

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Thomas F. Barth, 18, Army, Pfc., Lakewood, Calif.

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Ralph A. Vitch, 20, Army, SP4, Tampa, Fla.

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Patrick M. Hagerty, 19, Army, SP4, Youngstown, Ohio

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Albert J. Cartledge III, 23, Marines, Cpl., Dallas, Texas

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James Drew, 20, Army, SP4, Kansas City, Mo.

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Peter S. Borsay, 24, Army, Pfc., Salt Lake City, Utah

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Robert C. Yates, 18, Army, Pfc., Hondo, Texas

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Henry L. MacArthur, 18, Army, Pfc., Fuquay Varina, N.C.

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Ronald E. Morgan, 22, Army, Pfc., San Diego, Calif.

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Rudy A. Carnley, 23, Army, SP4, Lake Wales, Fla.

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Barry L. Unfried, 20, Marines, Pfc., Oroville, Calif.

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Gary R. Clodfelter, 20, Army, SP4, High Point, N.C.

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Larry D. Muller, 18, Marines, Pfc., Ojai, Calif.

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James A. Wright, 21, Army, SP4, Boring, Ore.

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William W. Olsen, 22, Army, Sgt., Pocatello, Idaho

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Robert F. Rose, 19, Army, SP4, Ashland, Ore.

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Michael K.L. Dixon, 19, Army, Pfc., Hawthorne, Calif.

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Edward T. Kiezkowski, 20, Army, SP4, Butler, Pa.

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David J. Ewing, 20, Army, SP5, Bloomfield Hills, Mich.

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Kenneth D. Pettigrew, 19, Army, Pfc., Redding, Calif.

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Warren Nix, 26, Army, Pfc., Tuscon, Ariz.

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Terry D. Clark, 18, Army, Pfc., Wallace, N.C.

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Jimmy W. Phipps, 18, Marines, Pfc., Culver City, Calif.

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Curtis Breedlove, 31, Army, 2nd Lt., Bryson City, N.C.

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Forrest L. Smith, 27, Army, S/Sgt., Columbus, Ga.

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Isaac Sapp, 21, Marines, Pfc., Williston, S.C.

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David L. Tiffany, 19, Army, SP5, Riverside, Calif.

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William W. Smith, 21, Army, Pfc., King City, Mo.

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Calvin E. Cooper, 20, Marines, Pfc., Kingstree, S.C.

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Gary R. Guest, 22, Marines, Cpl., Dorchester, Mass.

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Thomas R. Bliss, 20, Marines, L. Cpl., York, Pa.

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Clovis L. May, 24, Army, Sgt., Deming, N. Mex.

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Dennis L. Babcock, 19, Army, Pfc., Pacific Grove, Calif.

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Donald J. Deevers, 19, Army, Pfc., Hinton, Okla.

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Douglas J. Sommer, 18, Army, Pfc., Kearns, Utah

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Joe T. Conkle, 25, Army, 1st Lt., Hampton, Ga.

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Elmer E. Fields, 20, Army, Pvt., Fairfax, Okla.

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Jeffrey A. Richardson, 20, Army, Pfc., Red Lion, Pa.

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Russel Evans, 20, Army, Pfc., Sylvania, Ga.

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Emmett L. Davis, 18, Army, Pfc., Lakeland, Fla.

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Charles A. Jones, 29, Army, Sfc., Modesto, Calif.

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John H. Platt, 20, Army, Pfc., Early, Iowa

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Chris R. Martinez, 21, Army, Cpl., Alameda, Calif.

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James M. Leonard, 20, Army, Sgt., Edmond, Okla.

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Michael M. Hatzell, 19, Army, Pfc., San Jose, Calif.

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Thomas E. Hays, 20, Army, WO, Oklahoma City, Okla.

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Iran C. Brown, 19, Marines, L. Cpl., Roanoke, Va.

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Ralford J. Jackson, 20, Marines, Pfc., Tuba City, Ariz.

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Timothy K.P. Foster, 18, Marines, Pvt., Honolulu, Hawaii

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Virgil V. Hamilton, 20, Army, SP4, Brooksville, Fla.

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Donny R. Lawson, 21, Marines, L. Cpl., Grandview, Wash.

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Clarence Creaghead, 21, Army, SP4, Detroit, Mich.

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Keith A. Kahlstorf, 20, Marines, Pfc., Britt, Iowa

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Michael A. Powell, 19, Marines, L. Cpt., Atlanta, Ga.

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Byron B. Bowden, 21, Army, SP4, Arcata, Calif.

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Chris M. Pyle, 21, Navy, HM2, Hardesty, Okla.

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Patrick M. Dixon, 23, Army, 1st Lt., Dixon, Ill.

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Joseph C. Chisholm, 24, Army, SP4, Union Lake, Mich.

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Robert A. Pitts, 21, Army, Pfc., Galveston, Texas

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Albert O. Nelson Jr., 20, Marines, 2nd Lt., Alexandria, Va.

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Gary McCollough, 20, Army, Pfc., Charlotte, N.C.

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Charles D. Ervin, 18, Marines, Pfc., Lamont, Okla.

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James Titmas III, 19, Army, Pfc., Glendale, Calif.

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William J. Thornhill, 20, Army, Pvt., Baltimore, Md.

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John M. Randall, 20, Army, SP4, Phoenix, Ariz.

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Max Lisenby, 21, Marines, Cpl., Lawton, Okla.

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Gail G. Sanderson, 19, Marines, Pvt., Anthon, Iowa

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Robert P. Scibilia, 21, Army, SP4, Nashua, N.H.

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William A. Seigle, 20, Army, Pfc., Sapulpa, Okla.

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Gerald W. Posten, 20, Army, Pfc., Placerville, Calif.

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Howard S. Hill, 22, Army, Sgt., Irwin, Pa.

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David W. Kinney, 20, Army, Pfc., Charleston, W. Va.

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Ernest C. Munoz, 36, Marines, S/Sgt., San Antonio, Texas

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Cordell B. Rogers, 30, Army, Capt., Remsen, Iowa

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Larry E. Boyer, 22, Marines, Cpl., Williamstown, W. Va.

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Ronald A. Brown, 20, Army, Sgt., Huntington Park, Calif.

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John Winters, 18, Marines, L. Cpl., Clark, N.J.

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Floyd E. Barber, 23, Army, SP4, Franklin, Ohio

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Marvin C. Briss, 20, Army, SP4, Binford, N. Dak.

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Garey L. Grubbs, 20, Army, Pfc., Denver, Colo.

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Merlin J. Laber, 21, Army, SP4, Sykeston, N. Dak.

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John M. Hohman, 22, Army, CW2, Leominster, Mass.

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Gordon D. Perry, 19, Marines, Pfc., Morgantown, W. Va.

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James J. Wise, 20, Army, SP4, Detroit, Mich.

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Robert T. Bensberg, 28, Army, Capt., Columbus, Ga.

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Kenneth M. Seward, 22, Army, SP5, Greeley, Colo.

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Edward Frowner, 20, Army, Sgt., Manila, Ala.

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James S. Colombero, 24, Army, SP5, McCloud, Calif.

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Donald P. Seburg Jr., 19, Army, Pfc., Jackson, Mich.

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Milford E. Cobb, 33, Army, S/Sgt., Tempe, Ariz.

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Ronald A. Yashack, 21, Army, Pfc., Diagonal, Iowa

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Edison R. Phillips, 19, Army, Pfc., Plymouth, Pa.

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Gary C. Towle, 26, Army, Pfc., Concord, N.H.

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Douglas R. Matheson, 20, Army, Sgt., Columbiaville, Mich.

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Santiago V. E. Quintana, 20, Army, Pfc., Santa Fe, N. Mex.

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Charles A. Hilbert, 20, Army, Pfc., Parksville, Ky.

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Robert L. Anderson, 21, Army, Cpl., Middletown, N.Y.

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James Troy Ralph, 21, Army, SP4, Hobart, Ind.

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Orville Hampton, 37, Army, S/Sgt., Lawton, Okla.

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Cris Holliday, 20, Army, Pfc., Meridian, Miss.

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Billy W. Pettis, 21, Army, Pfc., Castleberry, Ala.

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William H. Darden, 20, Army, Pfc., Lanett, Ala.

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Jan Rauschkolb, 22, Marines, Cpl., Denver, Colo.

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Steven C. Owen, 22, Army, SP4, Long Beach, Calif.

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John W. Abbott, 23, Marines, 1st Lt., South Bend, Ind.

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William J. Peterson, 23, Army, 2nd Lt., Ephrata, Wash.

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Wayne E. Garven, 21, Army, Pfc., Mt. Vernon, Ohio

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William H. Beske Jr., 21, Army, Pfc., Lathrup Village, Mich.

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Ralph H. Crowley, 20, Army, Sgt., Remus, Mich.

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Yvon E. Girouard, 20, Marines, Pfc., Littleton, N.H.

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Errol W. Perreira, 21, Army, Pfc., Hilo, Hawaii

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Harold James Warmsley, 24, Army, SP4, Mansfield, La.

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Allen M. Graff, 21, Army, Sgt., West Covina, Calif.

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Robert Sigholtz Jr., 23, Army, Capt., Annandale, Va.

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Edward F. Clennon, 23, Army, Pfc., Joliet, Ill.

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Billy L. Thomas, 19, Army, SP4, Stinnett, Texas

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Richard L. Brumfield, 21, Army, Sgt., Denham Springs, La.

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Steven K. Sprinkle, 20, Army, SP4, Winston-Salem, N.C.

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Steven E. Murray, 19, Army, SP4, Indianapolis, Ind.

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Euan J. Parker, 22, Army, Pfc., Brigham City, Utah

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Emerson Martin, 21, Marines, Pfc., Gallup, N. Mex.

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James D. Johnson, 20, Marines, L. Cpl., Bedford, Texas

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Kenneth D. Shoaps, 20, Army, Sgt., Grosse Pointe Woods, Mich.

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Joey L. Boles, 21, Army, Pfc., Winchester, Ky.

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Bobby G. Newby, 21, Army, Pfc., Winchester, Ky.

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Thomas B. Paynter, 21, Army, SP4, Seattle, Wash.

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James F. Hilliard, 23, Army, Sgt., Kalamazoo, Mich.

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Michael E. Gerber, 20, Army, SP4, Conway Springs, Kan.

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Donald W. Ide, 25, Army, 1st Lt., Beirut, Lebanon

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Gary M. Paul, 19, Marines, L. Cpl., Norway, Mich.

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Gary W. Leighton, 19, Marines, Pfc., Washington, Pa.

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Derrill L. Price Jr., 20, Army, SP4, El Dorado Springs, Mo.

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Farrell J. Vice, 21, Army, SP4, Abbeville, La.

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Scott E. Cochran, 18, Army, Pfc., Eugene, Ore.

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Philip L. Gamble Jr., 26, Army, 2nd Lt., Newport, R.I.

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James W. Clark, 21, Army, 1st Lt., Reno, Nev.

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Terry V. Miller, 23, Army, Pfc., Ottumwa, Iowa

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Herman L. Judy Jr., 23, Army, Pfc., Alexandria, Va.

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James Herbert III, 20, Marines, Pfc., New Orleans, La.

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Willie L. Kirkland, 20, Army, SP4, Avon Park, Fla.

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Thomas A. Nebel, 20, Army, Pfc., Keota, Iowa

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Jim J. Walters, 20, Marines, Pfc., Sioux City, Iowa

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Dick E. Whitney, 22, Army, SP4, Newberg, Ore.

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Robert L. Boese, 22, Army, Pfc., Marion, Kan.

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Twenty-five men, killed in one week in the late spring of 1969, who did not have their pictures in the June 27, 1969, issue of LIFE.

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“Vietnam: One Week’s Dead,” LIFE magazine, June 27, 1969.

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