For the last several decades,
his photographs have brilliantly captured the defining moments in our city's
history. In this special one-on-one interview, Chicago Stories host
John Callaway and legendary photographer Art Shay discuss the stories behind
the pictures. The interview is punctuated with some of Shay's most memorable
photographs.
Art Shay survived 29 bombing missions over Germany during World War II
before becoming one of America's premier photojournalists, shooting thousands
of memorable pictures for Time, Life, Fortune, Sports Illustrated and
countless other publications. His new book Album for an Age not
only confirms him as a world class photographer, but also reveals him to
be a remarkable writer and storyteller. In this Chicago Stories,
Shay discusses his experiences covering The Mob, countless celebrities
and politicians, and tragic moments in Chicago history. Callaway also explores
Shay's family life, and the tragic murder of his son.
An excerpt from Album for an Age
From Album for an Age
Copyright © 2000 by Art Shay
Ivan R. Dee, Publisher
The manuscript of Some Came Running was over a foot thick. I photographed
James Jones, then, like me and my Life writer Roy Rowan, in his
mid-thirties. Jones proudly hefted the ultimate flop of a movie in the
workroom of his farmhouse in southern Illinois. I preferred the shot of
his lunging at me with one of his twenty-seven hunting knives.
"I got $750,000 for it," he said over and over again. "Much more than for From
Here to Eternity—including movie rights. Later he told Rowan and me, "You
know, I had sex with all the women in Eternity except Deborah Kerr—and
most of the men." That would have included Montgomery Clift. Not the kind of
information a family publication like Life would have used in those days.
Jones's mentor, Lowney Handy, stood at his side proudly nodding. She was
in her early fifties, busty, sly, and so fond of Jimmy. Basking in the
tolerant smile and shrug of her rich and loving husband, Lowney ran a nearby
writer's colony for young postwar novelists. Jimmy was her prize, but she
made no bones about loving the world of young writers. "Every Friday night
I send Jimmy into Terre Haute across the river to play sandwich with two
cute whores," Lowney told us. "He gets drunk there, rolls around with the
girls, then comes back here ready to write another week." One of the pictures Life ran
showed Jones drunk, hanging on a lamppost outside the Terre Haute brothel.
Lowney Handy hinted that occasionally she was extremely close to her boarders. "I
like to mother the boys," she said. "It's what writers need."
That night Jones hosted a party for some of the colony members. "Lowney's
reading manuscript back at the colony," Jones said. "I got these teachers
coming in. You gonna see some real action."
Rowan and I socialized with the young ladies but were more interested in
Jones's behavior, specifically in watching how the stud qualities he continually
broached would work out as Life picture coverage. We watched Jones
like two of the night owls coursing the prairie outside. He went to the
john twice, made a flat-out proposition to one of the teachers, was playfully
rebuffed, danced a few times, and played some of his beloved Django Reinhardt
guitar records. His sex score: zip!
When the other guests had gone, Jones dragged us to the kitchen table.
"I screwed the small one three times," he said, shaking his head in awe of his
own performance. He leaned toward Rowan and me. "This is what I like best about
parties, getting together with some buddies afterward, to talk about what happened.
That's why I'm never getting married. Here we are, three men of the world in
our mid-thirties---let me ask you guys something. Did either one of you ever
try it dog-fashion?"
Rowan and I exchanged fleeting glances speaking reams in both directions.
Here was a guy obsessed with sex, who had made a fortune putting Deborah
Kerr and Burt Lancaster on that famous beach making love with the tide
coming in...This guy who had what we judged to be a lusty writing coach...And
here he was asking us a kindergarten question about sex!
"What're you gonna do next?" I asked Jones before we left.
"Either go hiking along the Great Divide," he said. "Or learn skin diving in
the Bahamas."
"Could I go as photographer?" I pitched.
"Sure," said Jones.
"Would you mind if I got an assignment for us from Sports Illustrated?" I
asked. "With an advance?"
"Better and better," he said.
I called Sports Illustrated's managing editor Dick Johnston, an
old friend, and put Jones on. After a few minutes Jones hung up and put
his hand out. "They've already got something on the Great Divide. We're
goin' to skin-diving school, buddy. Let's get some scuba stuff and charge Sports
Illustrated."
The Jones story had a strange codicil for me. Some months later Jones phoned
me to say, "Hey, I met Marilyn Monroe's stand-in down in the Bahamas—;Gloria
Mosselino—and we got married. Now we're getting ready to move to Europe." He
invited me and my wife to his farewell party on New York City's upper west
side. Florence and I went to the party, which was held around an open steamer
trunk that dominated the living room. Periodically Jones or Gloria would
stuff something into the trunk. Adolph Green and Betty Comden sat with
their little chihuahua who doggedly and (to me) disgustingly kissed both
of them on their lips, begging for food morsels. The show people sang and
cracked wise. Jimmy took my picture ("like Upton Sinclair taught me") until
I got better, and if I got to Paris with my friends Nelson Algren and Simone
de Beauvoir, to call him for a party. We could bring Sartre and Camus.
Lots of alcohol flowed.
"You look like Scott and Zelda," I said as we parted.
"Yes, yes," Jones yelled. "That's who we are. Scott and Zelda." They left in
the morning to live and breed in Paris. He sent me a couple of picture postcards,
a manual on starving yourself into health&—and I never saw them again.
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