“Goin’ to Chicago Blues“; Joe Turner; Freddie Slack Trio; Count Basie; James Rushing; Publication date: September 8, 1941

New York Is a City Of Flat Topped Roofs
By Ralph Ingersoll
(Photos by Alan Fisher)

“Watch the Birdie“; Sonny Dunham and his Orch.; Don Raye; Gene dePaul; Harriet Clark; Publication date: September 8, 1941

When Is a Subject too Old to Photograph?
By Ralph Steiner
(Photos by Harold Corsini)

…What the photographer must realize is this: the Brooklyn Bridge is old, but life goes on around and over and under it, and life is always new. Mother and Child is an older subject than Brooklyn Bridge, yet it is still a good subject for painters and photographers who are sensitive enough to the ever-new qualities in their relationship.

The photographs of Brooklyn Bridge on this page look new because they show the relationship between the bridge and its neighbors. The elements are old but they add up to a new total.

If a photographer follows in the footsteps of the great who have gone before, [they] will end up without having made any interesting footsteps [themselves]. No artist in any medium has ever slavishly copied the approach and style of a great master and become a master in [their] own right. Strike out for yourself: see and photograph things you like in such a way that others will know why you like them. And since there is no one in the world exactly like you – this sounds like the last line of a love letter – your photographs will be fresh and interesting.

The Problem of Keeping City Kids Off the Streets
By Raymond Abrashkin
(Photographs by Mary Morris)

PLAY PLACES: There Aren’t Enough Satisfactory Playgrounds in New York
…and Many Kids Think It’s More Fun to Run Wild in the Streets
(Photographs by Mary Morris)

PM, September 8, 1940

“Rocks in My Bed“; Joe Turner; Freddie Slack Trio; Duke Ellington; Publication date: September 8, 1941

“Cuba Libre”; Xavier Cugat and his Orchestra; Lina Romay; Stillman; Cugat; Asherman; November 26, 1940

Batista Favored in Cuban Elections

“Planes”; [“(1) Dive Bomber Zooming; (2) Dive Bomber Zooming; (3) PB40 Plane Zooming; (4) P84 Plane Zooming; (5) P84 Plane Zooming; (6) Tri-Motor Bomber Passing Overhead”]; 1960

Arming The U.S.A.

Building and equipping war planes has become a major industry in Jamaica, Queens… The instrument is the view finder of an aerial military camera. It acts like the wrong end of a telescope in distorting the man’s face… Aerial cameras are indispensable in modern war… Photo by Alan Fisher.

“Air Raid”; [(Alert Sirens, Planes, Planes Overhead, Bursting Bombs, Building Crashing, Glass Splinters, and All Clear)], ca. 1960

Lightning, Rain, Trouble

Lightning smashed the skylight on Kanter’s Department Store, 132 W. 125th St. did $5,000 damage (estimated) to the stock. Photo by Weegee

[$5,000, in July 1940, had the same buying power as $96,141.07, in May 2021.]

“Continuous Thunder”; 1960

Joan Crawford, Shopping at Macy’s Finds a Camera Man There
Photo by Peter Killian, PM Staff

“IT’S ALL SO NEW TO ME (Todo es Tan Distinto)”; Joan Crawford Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Star; Marty Symes; Bernice Petkere; Nat W. Finston; 1939

“I’M NO COMMUNIST”; LULU BELLE AND SCOTTY; Lulu Belle & Scotty; Wiseman; 1952

Family Album

John Albert, of PM’s photographic staff, is the first entry in out Family Album who’s a native New Yorker. Here he’s shown working in PM’s laboratory… Photo by Leo Lieb, PM Staff

“The Camera Doesn’t Lie (Neither Do I) (La Camara No Miente),” Eddy Duchin and his Orchestra; Buddy Clarke; Edgar Leslie; Joe Burke, 1937

PM, July 12, 1940

A few songs released today, July 12, 1940:

“SULTAN SERENADE”; HORACE HENDERSON and his ORCHESTRA; F. Henderson; July 12, 1940

“DO RE MI”; Horace Henderson and his Orchestra; H. Henderson; July 12, 1940

“SOMETIMES I’M HAPPY”; “Music of Yesterday and Today Styled the Blue Barron Way”; Russ Carlyle; Irving Caesar; Vincent Youmans; July 12, 1940 [Thinking of Sun Ra and June Tyson…]

(1) Horses and Wagon; (2) Horses Gallop By; (3) One Horse Galloping By Fast

PM, July 8, 1940

McWilliams, Fascist Candidate, Faces His Future Undiscouraged

Joseph Ellsberry McWilliams, Fascist-type candidate of his American Destiny Party for Congressman, is still speaking at Yorkville street-corner meetings undiscouraged by his conviction in court Saturday of disorderly conduct. McWilliams is shown in the driver’s seat of a covered wagon, the emblem of his party. He must appear Wednesday in Felony court to pay a $50 fine or start serving a 30-day jail sentence. Meantime police officials of New York, New Jersey and Connecticut meet here today to study fifth-column problems. Photo by Weegee

1. Horses Hoofs (Turf) 2. Horses Hoofs (Turf) 3. Horses Hoofs (Cobbles), 1932

Weegee, Naked City, 1945, p.231

This is Joe McWilliams, professional anti-Semite and Nazi lover… Don’t make any mistake… that’s handsome Joe at the top of the picture… looking toward his future….

“Horses Don’t Bet on People,” Kay Kyser and his Orchestra; Clyde Rogers; Loeb; 1945

The New York Times, July 7, 1940

The New York Times, July 7, 1940

“My Pony’s Hair Turned Gray (When My Darling Ran Away),” Texas Jim Robertson; Bernard Houben; Mack Kaye; 1940

The New York Times, July 7, 1940 [$1.00 had the same buying power in July 1940 as $19.23 in May 2021.]

We Will Copy Your Favorite Old Photograph
There’s only one way to save those beloved old heirlooms – and that’s to copy them before they fade away forever…

Entirely irrelevant… a few great songs published on July 8, 1940:

“There is No Greater LoveAndy Kirk And His Clouds of Joy; Pha Terrell; Isham Jones; Marty Symes; July 8, 1940

“Midnight Stroll,” Andy Kirk And His Clouds of Joy; June Richmond; Sammy Lowe; Stanley Adams; July 8, 1940

“Now I Lay Me Down To Dream,” Andy Kirk And His Clouds Of Joy; Ted Fio Rito; Eddy Howard; Pha Terrell; July 8, 1940

(“Mexican Elections Heated Wind Up,” photos by Margaret Bourke-White)

“Rifftime,” Erskine Hawkins (The Twentieth Century Gabriel) and his Orchestra; Avery Parrish, Bluebird (B-11161-B), 1940

PM, July 3, 1940 (Interview by Cecelia Ager) [Raft was a close friend of Benjamin “Bugsy” Siegel, etc. etc…]

“I Smell a Rat,” “Young” Jessie And His Orchestra; “Young” Jessie; Stoller; Leiber, Modern Hollywood (921), 1954

“They Drive By Night,” 1940, associate producer, Mark Hellinger…

“They Drive By Night,” 1940, trailer

“Doctor Jazz,” Jelly-Roll Morton and his Red Hot Peppers; Joe Oliver; Jelly-Roll Morton; Omer Simeon; George Mitchell; Kid Ory; John Lindsay; Andrew Hilaire; Johnny St. Cyr , 1926

“Somebody’s Getting My Love,” Mabel Robinson; The 4 Blackamoors; Farrior; Nurse, 1941

PM, July 2, 1940

[The “gangster sought in a Brooklyn murder inquiry” was Vito Gurino.]

“Doctor Sausage’s Blues,” Doctor Sausage And His Five Pork Chops; Doctor Sausage; Tyson, 1940

“Money Blues (If You Ain’t Got No Money, I Ain’t Got No Use for You),” Camille Howard And Her Boy Friends; F. Wray; B. Carter, 1951

“…We let love take its course…”

“Everybody’s Got Money,” Eddie Beale Fourtette; Gene Forrest; Forrest; Dolphin; Hollywood (172-AA), 1951

In July 1940 $688,369.00 had the same buying power as $13,236,106.64 in May 2021.
In July 1940 $265,000.00 had the same buying power as $5,095,476.79 in May 2021.

“PLEDGE TO THE FLAG,” Igor Gorin; Albert Hay Malotte, 1940

(Photos by William Rhodes)

Demand For American Flags Biggest Since 1918; New York Factories Book

“(a) PLEDGE TO THE FLAG (b) THE STAR SPANGLED BANNER,” by Leopold Stokowski; The All-American Orchestra; Key; Goddard Lieberson, 1940

New York City Budget, 1940-21

“If Money Grew on Trees,” Eddie Rochester Anderson; Rene, 1940

“Money is Honey,” The Ramblers; O’Neil Spencer; Hopkins, 1939

Where the City’s Money Goes

PM, July 1, 1940

“Taxpayers’ Blues,” Bulee Gaillard and his Southern Fried Orchestra; Carroll; Gaillard; Norman Granz, 1952

PM, December 26, 1940 pp.16-17

Quakers March on New York with placards urging that America feed Hitler’s victims…

Christmas Pudding for these wounded British soldiers was served a few days early – so that this picture, sent from England by ship nail, could get here on Christmas day…

A Hitler Greeting of holiday ill-will toward England is loaded under a German bombing plane…

Loose Locomotive without a crew ran down spur in Chicago…

Nazi Troops are stationed in key spots throughout Rumania…

Union Label is the name of this strip act…

President Roosevelt Takes His Family and Guests to Church on Christmas…

Trans-Atlantic Greetings… are broadcast by Mayor LaGuardia and Lily Pons…

American Refugees arrive on S.S. Washington from the Orient…

First Aid fails to revive Paul Ryan, killed by a gas explosion in his apartment at 865 First Ave. Police said it was apparently suicide. The Christmas night blast shook the 17-story building and injured two house employees. PM photo by Weegee

PM, December 26, 1940 pp.16-17

865 First Ave., December 25 or 26, 2012

865 First Ave., December 26, 2020