to 1932 was another important milestone. In this
atmosphere of socially concerned photography, the
German publisher Willi Mu ̈nzenberg founded an
agency in part to expedite illustrations to promote
his Communist ideology for his magazineArbeiter-
Illustrierte-Zeitung(Worker Illustrated Magazine,
AIZ, 1924–1938) and in part because the existing
agencies, such as Mauritius-photo, ufa-photo, and
Ecce-photo had threatened to boycott Mu ̈nzen-
berg’s magazine. The example ofAIZ, influenced
as well by the model of TASS and the Soviet Infor-
mation Office’s Novosti Press Agency, led to the
rise of the illustrated newsmagazine in the United
States, includingForbes, Life, and Look, which
while employing their own staff, often published
photos provided by agencies. Another influential
agency was Dephot, founded in 1927 and brought
to international prominence under Simon Gutt-
man, represented a number of important photo-
journalists and photographers including Andreas
Feininger, N. Tim Gidal, Kurt Hulton, Felix
Mann, Erich Salomon, and Umbo.
Photo agencies had been established in the Uni-
ted States in the 1920s as well, including Keystone
and Worldwide. Pacific and Atlantic Photos,
whichestablishedanofficeinBerlinin1928,
merged with the Associated Press (AP) in the
1930s. The AP, which began as a cooperative
news agency in 1848, proved also to be one of
the leading news bureaus of the twentieth century,
covering general international news and providing
photographs sent by wire to newspapers and
magazines worldwide until this technology was
superseded in the later decades of the century. Its
still picture division, initially dubbed Wireworks,
transmitted its first wire photo—of a plane crash
in the Adirondack Mountains, New York—on
January 1, 1935. Its reputation for providing
news photography was sealed during the World
WarIIyearsbyitsmanycourageouswarcorre-
spondents who risked life and limb, some, such as
Joe Rosenthal, who took the famous shot of the
flag raising on Iwo Jima, dying in action. Eddie
Adams, who took memorable war photographs,
includingaVietCongbeingexecutedbyaVietna-
mese general, also took memorable photographs
of movie star Marilyn Monroe, typical of the
range of subject matter handled by AP correspon-
dents. Many of the most famous news pictures of
the twentieth century were taken by AP photogra-
phers, including the series showing the explosion
and crash of the Hindenburg blimp (Murray
Becker); the screaming, bloodied Chinese child in
the midst of bomb debris from the 1937 attack by
the Japanese on Shanghai (H.S. Wong); President
Harry S. Truman holding up theChicago Daily
Newserroneously announcing his defeat to Tho-
mas Dewey in the 1948 elections (Byron Rollins);
or the naked Vietnamese girl fleeing, with other
children, from a napalm attack (Nick Ut). Many
have received Pulitzer Prizes, including Horst
Faas, Yasushi Nagao, Steve Starr, and Paul
Vathis. Other large international news bureaus
employing photographers include the British con-
cern Reuters and Agence France Presse of France.
The 1930s saw the spread of photo agencies
throughout Europe, localized in various countries
but usually able to provide photographs to concerns
outside their immediate locales. Notable in Germany
was Berlin’s Presse-Photo. Group Polygoon was the
premier photo press agency in the Netherlands. In
Madrid, the news agency EFE, founded in 1939, in
its early years worked mostly as a propaganda arm
for the Franco regime. In France, Alliance Photos
and Three Lions were active in Paris. Perhaps the
most important of the French agencies, however, is
Rapho, founded in 1933 by the Hungarian immi-
grant Charles Rado. Rapho employed such figures
as Lisette Model. Rapho is also one of the few
European agencies from this era that survived; in
1977, Rapho merged with the Top Agency and in
2000, the agency joined Hachette Filipacchi Photos.
Photographers worked on assignment (commis-
sion) as well as submitted photographs for consid-
eration for both news publications as well as
fashion and lifestyle magazines. The rise of Adolph
Hitler and the Nazis, who set up their own propa-
ganda agency, Deutscher Verlag, brought this phe-
nomenon to a halt, and shifted attention to the
United States, where many photographers, jour-
nalists, and newspaper men had fled. Thus one of
the best known American agencies, Black Star, can
be said to have its origins in Europe. Founded in
New York City in early 1936, its principals, includ-
ing Ernest Mayer, who had directed the Mauritius
Publishing Company, which included Mauritius-
photo, a leading agency of the time, were all Ger-
mans fleeing Nazism. Photo agencies also began to
be established in other parts of the world. In Japan,
Nihon Kobo was founded in 1935.
After the focus on war photography during World
War II, a new landscape emerged for the photo-
journalist and the agency photographer. In part
inspired by underground or resistance news and
photo bureaus operating during the war, such as
the Dutch Particam and the Photo Division of
French Resistance (Services d’Information de la
France Combattante), many photographers wished
to continue the struggle to bring photographs of im-
portance to the public. Out of their war experiencesPHOTO AGENCIES