# World's Most Famous Photograph **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 18, 2002, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890 "2002-03-18T16:58:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Threadkiller](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/aca169/32.png) [@Threadkiller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Threadkiller)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 4:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/1 "2002-03-18T16:58:37Z")
A couple of recent events brought this question to mind: The National Geographic [Afghan Girl Found](http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/usatoday/20020313/ts_usatoday/3935672) story broke last week. > [@](#): > > …what became _National Geographic_ magazine’s most famous cover image… And recently the anniversary of the retaking (march 16) of Iwo Jima (see [Flags of Our Fathers](http://shop.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbnInquiry.asp?salesurl=Ishop.barnesandnoble.com/booksearch/isbninquiry.asp&isbn=0553111337)). > [@](#): > > …captures the story behind the most famous photograph taken during World War II: the raising of the flag at Iwo Jima… With the above as a good starting point I ask the question: What is _The most famous photograph ever_. I hope that we can get something factual but I suppose that “fame” is more than a bit subgective. A google search of [Most Famous Photograph](http://www.google.com/search?q=most+famous+photograph&btnG=Google+Search&hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&oe=ISO-8859-1) doesn’t yield anything substantive. A SDMB site search of “Famous Photograph” yielded only the [Aging Bodybuilders](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=84895&highlight=Famous+Photograph) thread. ---
**Author:** ![Moirai](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/96bed5/32.png) [@Moirai](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Moirai)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/2 "2002-03-18T17:09:44Z")
Well, let’s see. I have heard the National Geographic cover in question referred to in recent weeks as the “most recognizable photograph” but probably more Americans have seen the Iwo Jima staged flag raising image. I’ll admit, the photograph of that young girl is one of the most striking and unforgettable images I have ever seen. You should also throw in (for Americans, at least) that shot of the military man kissing the nurse in the middle of the street. And don’t forget the most requested photograph in the National Archives is… yep, Nixon and Elvis in the Oval Office! Usually subtitled- The President and the King. So, for “most famous” the NG cover gets my vote, as it has been seen worldwide rather than just regionally. ---
**Author:** ![maralinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@maralinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/maralinn)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 5:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/3 "2002-03-18T17:13:07Z")
When you did your Google search, you left out the quotation marks. This search is somewhat more substantive: [http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&oe=ISO-8859-1&q="most+famous+photograph"&btnG=Google+Search](http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&ie=ISO-8859-1&oe=ISO-8859-1&q=%22most+famous+photograph%22&btnG=Google+Search) ---
**Author:** ![SpoilerVirgin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/4491bb/32.png) [@SpoilerVirgin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SpoilerVirgin)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/4 "2002-03-18T17:18:40Z")
I don’t think that the photograph of the Afghan girl is in the running. While a lot of people (like me) recognized it when they saw it revived recently, if you asked people to name famous photographs they remember, I doubt it would have been mentioned very often. OTOH, Eisenstaedt’s [VJ-day kiss photo](http://www.pathfinder.com/photo/week/0814.htm) would probably have been on the list of everyone over a certain age, as would the Iwo Jima photo. I’d also add the photo of the Vietnamese girl running from napalm, and the student standing in front of the tank in Tienanmen Square. [Pulitzer Prize winning photographs](http://www.newseum.org/pulitzer/) are usually distributed worldwide – many of them have become very famous. It makes a difference whether we are defining “famous” as “seen by the most people” or “appreciated and remembered by the most people.” ---
**Author:** ![Threadkiller](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/aca169/32.png) [@Threadkiller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Threadkiller)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/5 "2002-03-18T17:36:58Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by maralinn \* > When you did your Google search, you left out the quotation marks. This search is somewhat more substantive: Somewhat better but not a whole lot. The search listed above yields a whole lot of qualifiers: [ul] - “in New England sports history” - “taken during World War II” - “by Ansel Adams” - “of the creature [Loch Ness Monster]”[/ul] On the first page of the google search there are two claimants: The [Che Guevara Photograph](http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/world/americas/newsid_1352000/1352650.stm) which I can’t really recall. Although the site does say: > [@](#): > > …Maryland Institute of Art called “the most famous photograph in the world and a symbol of the 20th century”… And the [Iwo Jima](http://www.jamesbradley.com/jamesbradley/press/apc_jim.htm) photograph. > [@](#): > > The striking photograph may be the most famous photograph ever and certainly was the most famous of World War II. Nothing else captured the hearts of the nation and - for that matter, the world - the way this one did. ---
**Author:** ![c\_goat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f4b2a3/32.png) [@c\_goat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/c_goat)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 6:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/6 "2002-03-18T18:14:10Z")
Well when I saw the thread title, I immediately thought of the Iwo Jima photograph. My money’s on that one. ---
**Author:** ![OxyMoron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/e9a140/32.png) [@OxyMoron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OxyMoron)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/7 "2002-03-18T18:24:51Z")
I’m especially curious to see the opinions of those outside the U.S. A couple of candidates: 1. The “Madonna of the Depression,” Dorothea Lange’s [portrait](http://www.smithsonianmag.si.edu/smithsonian/issues02/mar02/indelible.html) of a migrant mother and daughter. 2. Cliched as it’s become (is any college dorm without one?), Robert Doisneau’s [Kiss by the Hotel de Ville](http://www.masters-of-photography.com/D/doisneau/doisneau_kiss.html), 1950, too. 3. Spot photo of a man weeping as the Wehrmacht occupies Paris. 4. Viet Cong execution, from the Pulitzer website. It and the Napalmed girl (who went on to become a well-known dissident against the Communist regime) helped mobilize world opinion against the United States. ---
**Author:** ![KXL](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e47774/32.png) [@KXL](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KXL)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/8 "2002-03-18T18:36:53Z")
I wonder if it’s not this picture of the earth from the moon (or similar) [http://www.gerrold.com/index.htm](http://www.gerrold.com/index.htm) or maybe even man (here it’s Buzz Aldrin) on the moon (or similar) [http://images.jsc.nasa.gov/images/pao/AS11/10075267.jpg](http://images.jsc.nasa.gov/images/pao/AS11/10075267.jpg) But the first thing that came to my mind was Iwo Jima. -Kevin ---
**Author:** ![Keeve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/9 "2002-03-18T18:47:30Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by SpoilerVirgin \* > **OTOH, Eisenstaedt’s [VJ-day kiss photo](http://www.pathfinder.com/photo/week/0814.htm) would probably have been on the list of everyone over a certain age, as would the Iwo Jima photo. I’d also add the photo of the Vietnamese girl running from napalm,** Those are the first two I thought of, and in the same order. I don’t recall ever seeing the photo of that Afghan girl until it was on the cover of Nat Geog’s special issue a year or so ago. ---
**Author:** ![Keeve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/10 "2002-03-18T18:48:41Z")
Aaak! What I meant was the VJ Day and napalm photos, not Iwo Jima. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 7:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/11 "2002-03-18T19:00:35Z")
Tom Crouch’s _The Bishop’s Boys_, a biography of the Wright brothers, says the picture of their first flight at Kitty Hawk is the world’s most-_reproduced_ photo. ---
**Author:** ![toadspittle](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c0e974/32.png) [@toadspittle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/toadspittle)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/12 "2002-03-18T19:06:31Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by KXL \* > \*\*I wonder if it’s not this picture of the earth from the moon > (or similar) > > [http://www.gerrold.com/index.htm](http://www.gerrold.com/index.htm) > > or maybe even man (here it’s Buzz Aldrin) on the moon > (or similar) > > [http://images.jsc.nasa.gov/images/pao/AS11/10075267.jpg](http://images.jsc.nasa.gov/images/pao/AS11/10075267.jpg) > > But the first thing that came to my mind was Iwo Jima. > > -Kevin \*\* I second this. I think more people in the world have seen these than those others, which, I should think, would not be widely reproduced in, say, Japan (Iwo Jima, V-J kiss) or China (Tiananmen). ---
**Author:** ![Algernon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a183cd/32.png) [@Algernon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algernon)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/13 "2002-03-18T19:25:53Z")
Here is my list of what I thought of, in order, when I read the OP… [Iwo Jima](http://www.ap.org/anniversary/nhistory/images/photo.iwo.jima.gif) [Vietnamese girl napalmed](http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/art/napalm.gif) [Vietnam execution](http://www.chass.utoronto.ca:8080/%7Ebuschert/PHL385S/adams.html) [Kent State shooting](http://jmc-reunion2000.freeservers.com/images/Filo.gif) All but the Kent State photo has already been mentioned. For the most famous, I’d have to also vote for Iwo Jima. Upon reflection however, these are all American History related, so from a more worldwide perspective, perhaps one of the moon landing photos would be more famous. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/14 "2002-03-18T19:36:13Z")
This seems like a poll - I mean, I guess there’s a definitive answer, if ‘most famous’ means ‘recognized by more living people,’ but the true answer may be unattainable. The first thing I thought of was Jack Ruby shooting Oswald: [http://www.tw-zone.com/cosmo/photoshop/oswaldoriginal.html](http://www.tw-zone.com/cosmo/photoshop/oswaldoriginal.html) ---
**Author:** ![CzechHistory411](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/94ad74/32.png) [@CzechHistory411](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CzechHistory411)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 8:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/15 "2002-03-18T20:41:37Z")
> [@](#): > > - “of the creature [Loch Ness Monster]” How about [The Surgeon’s Photograph](http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/lochness/legend3.html) as the most famous photograph? Maybe the most famous photograph of something that doesn’t exist? Now, if I could find that photo of Nessie raising the flag at Iwo Jima… – CH ---
**Author:** ![Sofa\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Sofa\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sofa_King)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 8:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/16 "2002-03-18T20:44:42Z")
I don’t think this quite fits, but long ago I learned that da Vinci’s _Mona Lisa_ was the most recognizable image in the world. (Of course, it is probably now surpassed by the Nike swoosh.) Since the image likely only gained its worldwide popularity with the advances in photoreproduction, I thought I’d mention it. ---
**Author:** ![Labtrash](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/labtrash/32/528_2.png) [@Labtrash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Labtrash)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 8:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/17 "2002-03-18T20:50:17Z")
Would the Hindenburg burning at Lakehurst qualify, or would it mostly be here in the US (and to Led Zeppelin fans)?? Or maybe the footprint on the moon? Iwo Jima’s my computer’s wallpaper - has been since Sept 11 - VERY top of my list. ---
**Author:** ![Mielikki](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Mielikki](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mielikki)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/18 "2002-03-18T21:22:54Z")
I’m gonna go with this one. I’ve seen it used and copied a zillion times. [http://eluzions.com/Gallery/Space/Solar/Earth.html](http://eluzions.com/Gallery/Space/Solar/Earth.html) ---
**Author:** ![B.Serum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/b.serum/32/14266_2.png) [@B.Serum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/B.Serum)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 10:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/19 "2002-03-18T22:56:35Z")
Let’s not forget **Crash of the Hindenberg** (yes, it came from a newsreel, so there it’s not technically a single photo, but the still of the zeppelin just catching fire has been used many times) Oh the humanity! ---
**Author:** ![dna\_man](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d2c977/32.png) [@dna\_man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dna_man)\ **Post date:** [March 18, 2002, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890/20 "2002-03-18T23:41:02Z")
The world’s first photograph. [http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/photography/wfp/wfpmain.html](http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/photography/wfp/wfpmain.html) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/worlds-most-famous-photograph/98890.md?page=2)