| Member Profile:
MORTON BEEBE
1. Please give
us a thumbnail sketch of your 50 year career in photography and
photo-journalism. I was born in Oakland
and raised in Piedmont with my two brothers which makes me a third
generation Bay Area resident. Dad was in the canned food business
in San Francisco. I graduated Piedmont HS and UC Berkeley in Business.
Went to Naval Flight School and became a Public Information Officer
in Antarctica for Operation Deep Freeze during the International
Geophysical Year, 1957-8. This affected the course of my life.
The Antarctic coverage qualified me to join Magnum
and I started traveling and doing photojournalism stories in 1959.
I built a learning environment around a six member photo-agency
“GLOBECOMBERS” initiated in 1960 at the Squaw Valley
Winter Olympics. Eventually it included illustrators and film makers.
We split when we all got recognized for our own specialty.
From about 1962-1972, I worked in San Francisco as
an Associate Film Producer. This means I scouted locations for movies
and made all the necessary arrangements for photography in the city
with city government, talent and unions. My most notable projects
included Petulia, The Graduate, Ironsides, MacMillian and Wife and
two Woody Allen films. I returned to stills because of my frustration
at the endless time required for approvals and bothersome details.
It is a real wonder that all the details come together when it is
such a huge organism involved.
About that time, Larry Fried, then president of ASMP,
and I were talking and he sketched out on a napkin the business
plan for the Image Bank. Later, I started the West Coast franchise
of the Image Bank which expanded to have offices in San Francisco,
Los Angeles and Mexico City. That was a very time-demanding. Sadly,
my wife and I sold our franchise after five years - two years before
stock (known to some as “existing images”) became a
highly marketable. Then I started producing books, including the
highly successful San Francisco, City By The Bay, now in
its third edition, sixth printing.
At 69, I still am active and have many projects, such
as learning to pilot a new small submarine.
I am married to Danielle Chavanon Beebe and have five
nieces and nephews.
2. How
did you become interested in photography? I was always fascinated
by the captured moment, whether it was black and white or color,
still or video. I loved to sit in a darkened room and be transposed
by the movie. I think movies are the greatest art form of the twentieth
century.
Photography has been my passport to the world. Photography
also provides the sense of purpose and motivation to record the
situation Photos allow you to share the experience, especially when
it shows up in print. I always got a kick out of being published.
As a boy, the Oakland Tribune published some of his cartoons. Photography
took the place of a paintbrush.
When I was in high school, I used my Boy Scout card
to get me and a friend into the Japanese Peace Conference held in
San Francisco in 1945, the formal end of WWII. It was exciting to
see the Japanese Delegation and President Harry Truman with rooftop
security was all around. I had my 4x5 Speed Graphic and my friend
has his notepad. We said we were from the Piedmont Press (which
was a shopping journal), and attended the week-long event before
the Secret Service found us out.
I had the disadvantage of not going to a photo school. I plunged
into the school of hard knocks. I worked with greater imagination
than my contempories. I wasn’t satisfied in just making a
living with predictable in-house jobs. I was more excited at being
in the elements which is risky. Sometimes it rains. The environment
of life is more stimulating than being in a studio shooting table
tops.
3. What
have been your most interesting or favorite (dangerous, funny, odd,
unusual) situations or assignments? In the early 1960’s,
I was shooting the Bank of America “Man on the Spot”
ad campaign though out the world. My wife and I had been traveling
in Europe and flew to Logos, Nigeria. We were greeted by the military
that had just taken over the country. A military person was going
through our stuff with the butt of his rifle when the bank manager
turned up. He helped me save all the film from the European shoot
and got us to the hotel.
A day later, when photographing a bank person with
a village in the background, some locals misinterpreted our actions.
We ran into the car and a mob started rocking the car. The police
arrived and we were taken for interrogation. Surprisingly, the Magistrate
recognized the “Man on the Spot” campaign and apologized.
However, we decided to leave immediately. Unfortunately, the result
of this high-risk event was that the bank didn’t use our pictures
from Africa.
I enjoy skin diving and have photographed divers working
underwater on oil platforms for annual reports. Another risky event
occurred in the early sixties while diving at night with a Australian
salvager diving on the gigantic graveyard of WWII shipwrecks called
Iron Bottom Bay, Guadalcanal. Skin-buring toxic bubbles, a large
population of hungry sharks and no light made this a scary place.
Several times he opened passageway doors and, more than once, we
found skeletons.
Another risk in traveling is that I could be seen
as a person working for the CIA. That’s because spies are
generally seen as someone who is overly curious.
4. What
is important to you? Books are a source of pride. They will
last beyond my life as a reference. A librarian told me that San
Francisco was her favorite book and they had five copies because
it was in such demand. Furthermore, it has sustained itself over
13 years in spite of all the competition. What I did right was to
retain five writers instead of only one suggested by the publisher.
You want to avoid dating your material with quotes from city officials.
It is important to be a good communicator. I’m
not as clever a writer as photographer. It is easier to express
myself with photography than with writing. Photography is a wonderful
form of self expression and a universal language. I believe in the
“decisive moment”.
5. How
have you taught yourself to adapt to change? There are many
of my friends in my age group that fear the transition to digital.
I have a foot in both camps. I enjoy the speed and ease of digital
and continue to build my film archive.
I have noticed that older people distance themselves.
If you can, it is important to find a communal environment where
you can share and debate ideas. It’s a wonderful privilege
to participate with bright minds that are half your age. I get annoyed
when I am asked if I am “still taking” pictures.
In February, at age 69, I was among the first of 14
deep-sea explorers to be trained and licensed to pilot Deep Flight
Aviator at the world’s First Underwater Flight School in the
Bahamas. I followed in the footsteps (bubbles?) of (Relative) William
Beebe, a deep-sea explorer (who set the dive record of at 3028 feet
with Ottis Barton in 1934).
I was the only photojournalist and shot both video
and stills during the dives down to over 300 feet. I also created
a personal narrative of my experience going through the flight school.
My associate, in scuba gear, Tim Kelly shot underwater video of
the sub during my dives.
In addition, being on the National Board of ASMP is
a great way to keep involved and adapting to change.
6. Any
major regrets? That I was not on the list of NASA journalists
to go to the moon.
7. What
are the most important things you have learned? A photographer
has to be entrepreneurial and be a self starter. Your eye and your
experience becomes your signature, even if it doesn’t have
your credit line. When the San Francisco book was in the final layout
stage, my publisher, Harry Abrams, suggested that I show it to some
of my friends and see if they would be interested in order placing
a initial order. I approached the staff of BofA America and personalized
the book for corporate interests. I guess I was persuasive enough
because they bought 2,600 books and made it their world-wide gift.
8. What
is your favorite food? French cuisine.
9. Please
explain why you joined ASMP and what you have done with the organization
over the years. Please include any noteworthy events or moments.
When I joined ASMP in 1962, they had small informal meetings
in studios and homes, and you could rub shoulders with your seniors
and get info on how to do things. It was wonderful to go into Ansel
Adams darkroom.
ASMP is important now because it internationally recognized
and the leading lobbyist for photographers' rights in Congress.
I joined ASMP National board to give something back to our organization
after so many years of membership.
The biggest weakness of photographers is that they
do not know business practices. Many people yawn when you talk about
business practices, but it is important. Photographers need to learn
how to solicit business, as well as set up a business plan and know
the competiton. The worst thing is to borrow money and outfit a
studio and wait for business to come to you. I learned when my card
read "Image Bank”, I had l respect from bankers. Unfortunately,
as a freelancer, you are seen a risk.
And, you also need to get good advice—this is
where ASMP come in.
10. What
is something you would like people to know that was not asked? As
you approach 70, it doesn’t mean you have to retire to a golf
course in the Sierras. The advantage of photography is that your
hobby and your skills can continue until you eyes cave in and your
hands tremble. There is not much that is going to keep you from
expressing yourself in pictures. The clients and art directors half
my age are still calling.
“Photography in the fine arts” did not
exist in the 1950’s. Now photography is accepted as a fine
art and it is growing enormously. Never turn down an opportunity
of exhibiting your work. There are advantages to doing shows. As
example of this was the small show I had at the Bohemian club. A
member there offered me show at the De Young Museum, which was a
beautiful, large space. I did a show on the South Pacific, which
was seen by the Director of Marketing for American Airlines. The
airline was just starting to fly routes into the South Pacific and
he wanted to acquire the entire collection to travel to all airports
in the USA and internationally.
In addition, with an introduction to their ad agency,
I ended up with a contract to shoot all their double page destination
ads. I took my wife as my assistant and we worked with the copy
writer and art director throughout the South Pacific for 6 weeks.
This was the dream assignment of a lifetime! Now they sell seats
instead of destinations.
Lowell Thomas co-sponsored me for the Explorer’s
club based on what I’d done in Antarctica. It’s been
great! I’m proud to be a contributing member of ASMP, CORBIS,
and the Bohemian Club (founded by artists in 1872 in San Francisco).
Fantastic people join these clubs. We live in an area of incredibly
talented people which you wouldn’t normally encounter on a
daily basis. But, because I belong to these organizations , I have
meet actors, artists and scientists and come to understand their
passion and zeal.
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