In 1968, while covering the Vietnam War for the Associated Press, Eddie Adams photographed police chief General Nguyễn Ngọc Loan executing Vietcong prisoner Nguyễn Văn Lém. The photograph won Adams the Pulitzer Prize for Breaking News Photography and a World Press Photo award the following year.
Over the course of his 50-year career, Adams covered thirteen wars, six presidents, and captured notable images of celebrities and politicians around the globe. (The Guardian complied a selection of his works here.) In total, Adams won more than 500 awards for his exceptional photography. His fascinating career is captured in the 2008 documentary, An Unlikely Weapon: The Eddie Adams Story.
In 1988, Adams created The Eddie Adams Workshop (also known as the Barnstorm), a four-day photo-journalism seminar that is tuition free and gives promising photographers the opportunity to work with industry leaders and top editors in the field. Peter Jennings was among the notable participating faculty at the workshop.
Peter Jennings met Eddie Adams in the 1960s in Vietnam. The two would cross paths many times over the years and they developed a life-long friendship. An admirer of Adam’s work, Jennings acquired several photographs, including the present lot, for his own collection.
Television journalist Peter Jennings started his career in broadcasting as the host for a Canadian radio show when he was just nine years old. Within a few short decades, Jennings was a household name known across America for his reporting for ABC. His storied career started in 1965 when Jennings became the youngest news anchor in America hosting Jennings With the News on ABC. The program was not an initial hit and Jennings moved abroad working as a foreign correspondent establishing the first American news bureau in the Middle East. For several years he covered major international news events for ABC and by 1978 he appeared nightly on World News Tonight as the Foreign Desk Anchor alongside colleagues Frank Reynolds in Washington and Max Robinson in Chicago. In 1983, following the unexpected death of Frank Reynolds, Jennings became the sole anchor of World News Tonight, a role he would keep until 2005.
From interviews with foreign leaders to exposés and multi-hour coverage of tragic events such as 9-11, Peter Jennings became a trusted voice in the American home. It is with great honor that Toomey & Co. presents works from The Estate of Peter Jennings at auction.
