Dirck Halstead

Halstead was born in Huntington, New York, on December 24, 1936.{{cite news|title=Dirck Halstead, Photojournalist Who Captured History, Dies at 85|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/25/business/media/dirck-halstead-dead.html|first=Neil|last=Genzlinger|date=March 25, 2022|access-date=March 26, 2022|newspaper=The New York Times}} His father, William S. Halstead, was an inventor in radio and television development. He held many patents for his pioneer work in radio and television, including stereophonic FM radio, and developing mountain-top relay systems that were key for building TV networks in Japan and Jordan.{{cite news|title=William Halstead, 84, Stereo Radio Innovator|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1987/07/11/obituaries/william-halstead-84-stereo-radio-innovator.html|page=37|date=July 11, 1987|access-date=March 26, 2022|newspaper=The New York Times}} His mother, Leslie (Munro) Halstead, worked as a telecommunications engineer. Halstead was given a Kodak Duaflex camera by his parents for Christmas when he was 15 years old, and began photojournalism while in high school. Two years later, he became Life magazine's youngest combat photographer covering the Guatemalan civil war. He studied at Haverford College for one year, before dropping out to work in Dallas. He was subsequently drafted into the US Army and served for two years. Upon his return from military service, Halstead joined UPI and ultimately worked there for more than 15 years. During the Vietnam War, he was UPI's picture bureau chief in Saigon.

File:18thARVNsoldiersatxuanloc by Dirck Halstead.jpg of the Army of the Republic of Vietnam at Xuan Loc in April 1975]]

Time designated Halstead as their Senior White House Photographer in 1972.{{cite news|title=US photographer Dirck Halstead dies at 85|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-60878983|date=March 25, 2022|accessdate=March 26, 2022|publisher=BBC News}} He later accepted a contract with them that same year which lasted for the next 29 years. Halstead was one of the six photographers who accompanied Richard Nixon on his historic trip to China in 1972.{{cite news|title=In Memoriam: Dirck Halstead, 1936–2022|url=https://briscoecenter.org/about/news/in-memoriam-dirck-halstead-1936-2022/|date=March 25, 2022|access-date=March 26, 2022|website=Dolph Briscoe Center for American History |publisher=University of Texas at Austin}} His photographs have appeared on 49 Time covers, more than any other photographer. During this period he also worked as a "Special Photographer" on films to produce photographs used in advertising materials for the major commercial studios. The films he worked on included Goodfellas, Memphis Belle, Shaft, Black Rain, Dragon, Dune, Conan the Barbarian series, Greystoke, and Cliffhanger.

Halstead won the National Press Photographers Association Picture of the Year award twice, the Robert Capa Gold Medal for his coverage of the fall of Saigon, and two Eisies.{{cite news|access-date=March 15, 2019|title=A Hug for Lewinsky Wins an Eisie Award|url=https://www.nytimes.com/1999/02/08/arts/a-hug-for-lewinsky-wins-an-eisie-award.html|newspaper=The New York Times|date=February 8, 1999|issn=0362-4331}} In 2002 he received the lifetime achievement award from the White House News Photographers Association, and in 2004 he won the Joseph A. Sprague Award{{cite web|access-date=March 15, 2019|title=NPPA: Honors and Recognitions - Joseph A. Sprague Award|url=http://nppa.org/about_us/honors_and_recognitions/sprague/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100427081958/http://nppa.org/about_us/honors_and_recognitions/sprague/|url-status=dead|archive-date=April 27, 2010|date=April 27, 2010}} for lifetime achievement and service to photojournalism. The Missouri Honor Medal from the University of Missouri School of Journalism was given to Halstead in 2007 for superior achievement in journalism.{{cite web|access-date=March 15, 2019|title=The Missouri Honor Medal|url=https://journalism.missouri.edu/jschool/honor-medal-winners/ |department=Missouri School of Journalism |publisher=University of Missouri}}

The archive of Halstead's works is located at the Dolph Briscoe Center for American History at The University of Texas at Austin,{{cite web |url=https://txarchives.org/utcah/finding_aids/00311.xml |title=Dirck Halstead Photographic Archive, 1933-2001 |department=txarchives.org |access-date=March 29, 2022 |location=Texas Archival Resources Online}}{{cite web |url=https://briscoecenter.org/collections/photojournalism/ |department=Dolph Briscoe Center for American History |title= Photojournalism }} where he was a senior fellow in photojournalism.{{cite web|title=Dirck Halstead|url=https://journalism.missouri.edu/honor-medal-winner/dirck-halstead/|date=July 13, 2012|accessdate=March 26, 2022 |department=Missouri School of Journalism |publisher=University of Missouri}} His book Moments in Time: Photos and Stories from One of America's Top Photojournalists, was published in 2006.

Halstead's three marriages all ended in divorce. He resided in Boquete, Chiriquí, Panama, during his later years and died there of a cerebral hemorrhage on March 25, 2022, aged 85.

• Moments in Time: Photos and Stories from One of America's Top Photojournalists. Halstead, Harry N. Abrams, 2006. {{ISBN|9780810954410}}.

{{reflist}}

• [http://www.digitaljournalist.org/ The Digital Journalist website]
• [http://dirckhalstead.net Halstead's website]
• {{imdb name|1673378}}
• {{discogs artist|Dirck Halstead}}
• [https://omeka.binghamton.edu/omeka/items/show/955 Interview with Dirck Halstead] by Stephen McKiernan, Binghamton University Libraries Center for the Study of the 1960s, November 14, 2011

{{Vietnam War correspondents}}

{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Halstead, Dirck}}

Category:1936 births

Category:2022 deaths

Category:People from Huntington, New York

Category:Haverford College alumni

Category:American male non-fiction writers

Category:American photojournalists

Category:Photography in Vietnam

Category:American war photographers

Category:American editors