Tom Hoy, October 20, 2012

Tom joined the old Washington Star in 1953 at age 17. It was a 14-year career that saw him cover a lot of the nation's triumph and tragedy. He made a beautiful, poignant image of a shrouded Jacqueline Kennedy hugging her children at their father's gravesite – choosing to go tight rather than do what everyone else did – go wide to include the eternal flame marking the President's resting place.

The now-famous shot
Photo: Tom Hoy
Tom Hoy, then a staff photographer with the Washington Star, took a big gamble when he decided to stay at his behind-the-podium vantage point when President John F. Kennedy came to speak at the DC National Guard Armory in 1962. All Hoy's colleagues went 'round front to make the standard speaking-from-the-lectern shot. But Tom, sensing that the arena lights – and the photo gods – might favor him, got off this perfect, emblematic shot right before the Secret Service ushered him away. The pic has been published worldwide.

JFK: Risky Angle – Great Shot
Attribution: Washington Post, Tom Hoy

1 comment:

John (Jack) SherwoodJuly 18, 2013 at 1:44 PM
Whenever I set out on a feature, I always tried to get Tom as my photographer. We laughed at the same things and he even became interested in sailing, Every restaurant meal to him was "out of this world." We had lost contact in recent years and his death, many monwths after the fact, shocked me. I would like to contact his wife, Barbara, but have no idea oif how o reach her.

John Sherwood.