George Galdorisi Interviews with John Gresham about The Kissing Sailor

Modern photojournalism as we know it today, has its roots in Antebellum America during the mid-1800s.  Evolved in the crucible of the American Civil War, photojournalism at its best is able to do something that audio, motion pictures and video cannot: capturing moments in time and create an iconic memory for the ages. Nowhere was this more true, then during the heyday of film-based image capture in World War II. Courageous and daring combat photojournalists like Robert Capa, Joe Rosenthal and Capt. Edward Steichen risked their lives around the world to capture the iconic images that defined combat during that era for a generation of Americans. But it was a single photograph, captured on the final day of World War II, in of all places Times Square, that every American associates with VJ ( Victory Over Japan) Day: Alfred Eisenstadt’s classic The Kissing Sailor. Made world-famous by its publication in LIFE Magazine, The Kissing Sailor stood as proof to a weary America that the war was over, and peace was at hand.

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