Ed Clark (July 3, 1911, Nashville, Tennessee – January 22, 2000, Sarasota, Florida) was a photographer who worked primarily for Life magazine.
His best remembered work captured a weeping Graham W. Jackson Sr. playing his accordion as the body of the recently deceased President Franklin D. Roosevelt was being transported to Washington, DC.
Clark dropped out of Hume-Fogg High School after he told the editor of the Nashville Tennessean newspaper he was a photographer and got a job as an assistant.
[2][5] When he received a telephone call informing him that President Franklin D. Roosevelt had died, he drove all night from his home in Nashville to Warm Springs, Georgia.
[6][5] As the President's body was being taken to the train station, Clark, alone among the swarm of photographers present, noticed United States Navy bandsman Graham W. Jackson Sr. playing "Goin' Home", one of Roosevelt's favorite tunes, on his accordion as tears ran down his face.
"[8] The iconic photograph was published full page in the April 17, 1945, issue of Life, capturing the nation's grief.
He took a series of pictures of a then unknown Marilyn Monroe which were not published at the time; much later, they came to light during a search of Life's archives.
[1][14] The same year, Edward Steichen included his work in MoMA's blockbuster, world-touring The Family of Man exhibition, seen by more than nine million people.