WEBVTT - Weegee the Famous 0:00:01.280 --> 0:00:04.320 Welcome to Stuff you missed in History Class, a production 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:13.400 of I Heart Radio. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. 0:00:13.400 --> 0:00:17.040 I'm Holly Fry and I'm Tracy V. Wilson. This is 0:00:17.079 --> 0:00:21.119 gonna not be related exactly to what we're talking about today. 0:00:21.160 --> 0:00:26.840 But Tracy, have you watched the documentary series Light and Magic? Okay, Well, 0:00:26.840 --> 0:00:30.600 it's amazing. UM if you are a film dork and 0:00:30.880 --> 0:00:35.519 you you love particularly VFX. Uh, it is about the 0:00:35.560 --> 0:00:38.479 beginnings of industrial light and magic and how all of 0:00:38.520 --> 0:00:43.040 those people really did, in their very very disorganized and 0:00:43.040 --> 0:00:47.120 wonderful creative ways, UM, change the film industry. But that 0:00:47.200 --> 0:00:49.720 is not at all what we're talking about today. We 0:00:50.640 --> 0:00:55.240 bring this up because in one of his interviews, Richard Edlund, 0:00:55.280 --> 0:00:59.680 who is one of the great uh forerunners of visual 0:00:59.720 --> 0:01:04.000 effect X, at least in the modern era, mentioned himself 0:01:04.040 --> 0:01:07.280 as a kid running around with a camera and he 0:01:07.440 --> 0:01:09.319 I don't remember the exact quote, but he says, you know, 0:01:09.400 --> 0:01:11.480 like looking like I was Wegi, and I was like, 0:01:11.520 --> 0:01:16.480 oh I forgot I had Wegi on my list. Uh. Weigi, 0:01:17.000 --> 0:01:19.160 if that name is not familiar to you, is a 0:01:19.200 --> 0:01:23.520 fairly famous photographer. UM. He's often cited as having been 0:01:23.560 --> 0:01:26.440 a really strong influence on the work of artists like 0:01:26.520 --> 0:01:30.560 Dan Arbis and Andy Warhol, but on the on a 0:01:30.640 --> 0:01:34.119 bigger scale because he's pretty unique in that a lot 0:01:34.160 --> 0:01:36.920 of people saw his work without knowing who he was, 0:01:37.040 --> 0:01:40.080 and he was also getting attention from the art world. Uh. 0:01:40.200 --> 0:01:43.400 He influenced the entire world really in how New York 0:01:43.480 --> 0:01:46.600 City was viewed by people, both people who lived in 0:01:46.600 --> 0:01:48.880 the city and people outside of it, because he really 0:01:48.920 --> 0:01:52.080 showed the city through his lens in a way that 0:01:52.160 --> 0:01:55.960 was very unvarnished and raw, in stark black and white. 0:01:56.000 --> 0:01:59.200 So that is who we are talking about today. So 0:01:59.280 --> 0:02:02.280 he's known as we G today. He was born Usher 0:02:02.360 --> 0:02:05.520 Felic in Zulichev, which at the time was in Austria 0:02:05.600 --> 0:02:08.640 Hungary now it's in Ukraine. That was on June twelf 0:02:10.400 --> 0:02:13.360 and when he was seven, his father, Bernard left for 0:02:13.400 --> 0:02:16.400 the United States, so Usher and his mother and his 0:02:16.560 --> 0:02:20.280 three siblings stayed behind. They were there for the next 0:02:20.360 --> 0:02:23.840 four years while Bernard was working on all kinds of jobs, 0:02:23.919 --> 0:02:26.480 just trying to get settled enough that he could send 0:02:26.520 --> 0:02:28.440 for the rest of the family and have them join 0:02:28.560 --> 0:02:32.840 him in the US. At one point early on, he 0:02:32.960 --> 0:02:37.320 sent his wife some stage money as a joke. She 0:02:37.480 --> 0:02:40.359 initially thought it was real. I'm a little just irritated 0:02:40.400 --> 0:02:46.240 by this story. Uh. She packed herself up at the 0:02:46.320 --> 0:02:48.840 children and got ready for a move, and the bank 0:02:49.120 --> 0:02:53.560 also initially thought this was real and exchanged this currency. 0:02:54.040 --> 0:02:56.200 They figured it out though, before the family left for 0:02:56.240 --> 0:02:59.400 the US and they had to cancel their move. Yeah, 0:02:59.600 --> 0:03:02.760 I mean, uh, this is all based on of course, 0:03:03.040 --> 0:03:07.560 we's later recollections, and he's known for kind of embellishment 0:03:07.600 --> 0:03:11.320 and whatnot. But the way he describes the money, it 0:03:11.480 --> 0:03:15.280 had some pretty key indicators that it was fake, like 0:03:15.320 --> 0:03:19.480 a joker on the back and stuff, but like not 0:03:19.680 --> 0:03:24.040 legal tender and right, and it wasn't like from a game. 0:03:24.080 --> 0:03:25.560 It was like to be used in a play. It 0:03:25.600 --> 0:03:29.360 was stage money, but apparently good enough to fool a bank. 0:03:30.080 --> 0:03:33.720 But they did eventually make it in nineteen o six, 0:03:33.800 --> 0:03:37.400 when Usher was still ten, the family was finally reunited. 0:03:37.560 --> 0:03:40.600 At that point, Bernard had started a push cart of 0:03:40.680 --> 0:03:43.280 his own to make money because he had just struggled 0:03:43.360 --> 0:03:45.600 so much trying to get other people to give him 0:03:45.640 --> 0:03:49.520 an opportunity that actually paid a decent living wage. This 0:03:49.600 --> 0:03:51.440 was a lesson that I think you can see as 0:03:51.480 --> 0:03:55.400 we talk about Wei's life story, it clearly imprinted on 0:03:55.680 --> 0:03:59.640 his son, Usher, and in later years, Ogi wrote about 0:04:00.200 --> 0:04:03.040 coming to the United States and said that Ellis Island 0:04:03.080 --> 0:04:07.480 seemed quote the most beautiful place in the world, even 0:04:07.520 --> 0:04:11.080 as immigration officials inspected him and his family to make 0:04:11.080 --> 0:04:14.320 sure they weren't bringing disease into the country. But what 0:04:14.480 --> 0:04:17.880 really struck this ten year old boy was being given 0:04:17.960 --> 0:04:20.720 fresh fruit while he was there. He had never, he said, 0:04:20.800 --> 0:04:24.000 seen a banana or an orange before. And his name 0:04:24.080 --> 0:04:27.520 also changed at this point, at least on paper, to Arthur. 0:04:27.680 --> 0:04:30.120 He does not appear to have ever gone by that name, 0:04:30.880 --> 0:04:33.279 and his family certainly didn't use it, but in the 0:04:33.400 --> 0:04:37.239 United States and in biographies, she'll often see him listed 0:04:37.360 --> 0:04:41.479 as Arthur Felik. The family moved soon after that from 0:04:41.480 --> 0:04:44.960 Bernard's Lower East Side tenement apartment on Pitt Street to 0:04:45.040 --> 0:04:47.880 another at the corner of Cherry and Jackson that was 0:04:47.960 --> 0:04:51.120 right next to a public school, and his father had 0:04:51.160 --> 0:04:54.440 negotiated for the family to live there for free because 0:04:54.440 --> 0:04:55.680 he and his wife were going to do all the 0:04:55.680 --> 0:05:00.640 buildings janitorial work. They still struggled financially, they were still 0:05:00.640 --> 0:05:04.400 trying to learn English. They were often called out as oigners, 0:05:04.400 --> 0:05:07.880 but we do described his family as having a pretty 0:05:08.000 --> 0:05:10.640 happy time during this point in his life. Yeah, he's 0:05:10.839 --> 0:05:14.279 he whether or not he is um glossing over it 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:17.159 or making it sound better than it was because he 0:05:17.160 --> 0:05:19.479 talks about going hungry sometimes. He still talks about like 0:05:19.680 --> 0:05:21.600 it was pretty carefree though for me, and I really 0:05:21.600 --> 0:05:26.040 liked my childhood. As he was learning English, Usher at 0:05:26.040 --> 0:05:29.159 the time became engrossed in the stories of Horatio Alger, 0:05:29.200 --> 0:05:33.840 who famously popularized the rags to riches story in popular novels. 0:05:34.680 --> 0:05:37.880 The young Fellig was convinced that he too could amass 0:05:37.920 --> 0:05:40.680 wealth if he just worked hard enough, just like the 0:05:40.720 --> 0:05:43.159 boys in the books. So he started his own paper 0:05:43.279 --> 0:05:46.400 route just pretty enterprising. But the problem was he could 0:05:46.440 --> 0:05:49.520 only get English language papers, and most of his neighbors 0:05:49.560 --> 0:05:52.159 were immigrants to They could not read English well enough 0:05:52.160 --> 0:05:54.760 to want to buy a daily paper, so that didn't 0:05:54.760 --> 0:05:58.800 pan out. Usher moved on to reading detective novels and 0:05:58.839 --> 0:06:02.760 transitioned his person no business to selling candy. He started 0:06:02.760 --> 0:06:07.520 out by purchasing the candy on credit. He somehow talked 0:06:07.520 --> 0:06:10.240 to a store manager into allowing him to do this, 0:06:10.320 --> 0:06:12.640 and then he took the candy cart around to the 0:06:12.720 --> 0:06:16.080 sweatshops in the neighborhood after school. He would sell things 0:06:16.120 --> 0:06:18.560 like chocolate and chewing gum to the women who were 0:06:18.600 --> 0:06:22.440 working in these sweatshops during their breaks. He reported making 0:06:22.480 --> 0:06:25.960 a hundred percent profit from this enterprise, and he gave 0:06:26.000 --> 0:06:28.320 all of his earnings to his parents to just keep 0:06:28.320 --> 0:06:32.040 the family fed and clothed. When Usher was fourteen, he 0:06:32.120 --> 0:06:35.120 quit school. He was a smart kid and he did 0:06:35.160 --> 0:06:38.160 pretty well, but he found it very boring compared to 0:06:38.200 --> 0:06:40.039 the rest of his life. He also was known to 0:06:40.080 --> 0:06:43.240 sleep in and he would kind of sleep until he 0:06:43.240 --> 0:06:45.240 heard the bell, and then, since he lived right next 0:06:45.240 --> 0:06:47.240 door to the school, he would just kind of run over, 0:06:47.279 --> 0:06:51.640 looking completely disheveled, and start his day. Although his principle 0:06:51.880 --> 0:06:54.720 really tried to get him to finish school because he 0:06:54.800 --> 0:06:57.640 was pretty smart, the family really needed more money than 0:06:57.680 --> 0:06:59.880 he was pulling in with his after school candy car, 0:07:00.160 --> 0:07:04.680 and he had already become fascinated with photography before he 0:07:04.760 --> 0:07:07.839 had left school. A street photographer had taken his picture 0:07:07.920 --> 0:07:10.440 with a tin type camera. Those were the cameras that 0:07:10.520 --> 0:07:13.520 captured images on sheets of metal that had a dark 0:07:13.640 --> 0:07:18.400 lacquer coating. This whole experience had really captivated him. He 0:07:18.480 --> 0:07:22.560 saved up enough money to order his own inexpensive tin 0:07:22.640 --> 0:07:26.160 type camera, so he did manage to get an eight 0:07:26.200 --> 0:07:29.440 am to six pm job with a photography studio after 0:07:29.480 --> 0:07:32.560 a few months of working with this tin type. He 0:07:32.720 --> 0:07:35.880 definitely saw this as a way to continue his education 0:07:36.040 --> 0:07:40.720 and learn from actual photographers. That studio specialized in taking 0:07:40.720 --> 0:07:44.160 photographs of large objects that door to door salesman would 0:07:44.160 --> 0:07:47.640 then use to make their pitches to potential buyers. It 0:07:47.680 --> 0:07:51.680 of course, was not realistic to carry things like furniture, chandeliers, 0:07:51.760 --> 0:07:55.560 and headstones around to make sales, and Ushered worked as 0:07:55.560 --> 0:07:58.920 an assistant, positioning the products and the lights as directed, 0:07:59.200 --> 0:08:01.320 and just trying to make everything look as good as 0:08:01.360 --> 0:08:05.200 possible for these photos. He also ran errands. He swept 0:08:05.280 --> 0:08:07.880 up after shoots. He did basically all of the jobs 0:08:07.880 --> 0:08:10.040 that the lowest man on the ladder would be assigned. 0:08:11.360 --> 0:08:15.480 The other area of specialty for this photography business was 0:08:15.520 --> 0:08:20.200 taking photos of burned out buildings for insurance filings. Usher 0:08:20.440 --> 0:08:23.360 was in charge at these shoots of blowing flash powder. 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:26.880 He described blowing the powder through a tube onto alcohol 0:08:26.960 --> 0:08:30.560 soaked rags to ignite that powder and light up the photograph. 0:08:30.720 --> 0:08:33.240 It's probably informed his later work doing a lot of 0:08:33.320 --> 0:08:36.320 night photography. But for all of this work, some of 0:08:36.360 --> 0:08:40.160 it pretty dangerous. The flash powder not always very safe 0:08:40.160 --> 0:08:43.320 to be around. He made four fifty a week. So 0:08:43.480 --> 0:08:48.040 two years and his job, the camera operator left and 0:08:48.200 --> 0:08:52.240 Usher was promoted into that vacant position. When his boss 0:08:52.280 --> 0:08:55.480 refused to pay him even half of what the previous 0:08:55.600 --> 0:09:00.120 camera operator had made, Usher quit on the spot. This 0:09:00.240 --> 0:09:02.680 might sound rash for somebody who was helping to support 0:09:02.800 --> 0:09:05.880 his family, but Usher had a whole other income stream 0:09:05.920 --> 0:09:09.240 because he was still selling candy on the side, although 0:09:09.400 --> 0:09:13.160 his later work hours had led to him transitioning to 0:09:13.240 --> 0:09:17.040 selling this candy at burlesque clubs instead of it factories. 0:09:17.960 --> 0:09:21.400 And at this point Usher was eighteen, So he bought 0:09:21.440 --> 0:09:24.640 himself of you camera and he started his first career 0:09:24.679 --> 0:09:28.360 as a freelancer. And he was really really pretty smart. 0:09:28.440 --> 0:09:33.040 You'll see throughout his story he's pretty savvy about business. Uh. 0:09:33.120 --> 0:09:35.680 He he kind of made his own customer base, so 0:09:36.080 --> 0:09:39.800 he would take photographs of children on the weekends riding 0:09:39.840 --> 0:09:42.520 a pony that he rented. Basically, he would just get 0:09:42.559 --> 0:09:44.839 neighborhood kids and put him on this pony and take 0:09:44.840 --> 0:09:47.640 their picture, and then once he had developed the proofs, 0:09:47.640 --> 0:09:50.520 he would visit those kids parents, show them nose proofs, 0:09:50.720 --> 0:09:52.760 and then be like, don't you want to order some prints. 0:09:55.160 --> 0:09:57.160 He later wrote that he believed that there was not 0:09:57.320 --> 0:09:59.760 a single East Side home that didn't have one of 0:09:59.800 --> 0:10:02.280 his photos of a child on a pony sitting in it. 0:10:02.920 --> 0:10:06.439 But once boarding the pony outpaced his income, he had 0:10:06.480 --> 0:10:09.640 to give that enterprise up. This is the time of 0:10:09.760 --> 0:10:13.280 restlessness for Usher. He wanted to move out on his own. 0:10:13.440 --> 0:10:16.400 Although this was painful for his family, they were really 0:10:16.400 --> 0:10:19.640 close knit, it was upsetting to his mother. In particular, 0:10:20.400 --> 0:10:23.240 she caught him trying to leave with a suitcase and 0:10:23.360 --> 0:10:26.400 was so upset about it that he stayed. A few 0:10:26.400 --> 0:10:28.720 weeks later, he sneaked away when the rest of the 0:10:28.760 --> 0:10:31.880 family was asleep. This was a bold and kind of 0:10:32.000 --> 0:10:35.400 foolhardy move. He didn't have money or a job or 0:10:35.440 --> 0:10:38.680 a place to stay, so he was sleeping in parks 0:10:38.720 --> 0:10:42.559 and missions, but eventually started spending the night at Pennsylvania Station. 0:10:43.400 --> 0:10:46.240 He had a whole routine where every night he would 0:10:46.280 --> 0:10:48.719 check the pay phones for loose change, and then he 0:10:48.760 --> 0:10:51.040 would find a bench in the waiting room to sleep 0:10:51.080 --> 0:10:54.320 on until police came to move people out in the morning. 0:10:54.960 --> 0:10:57.480 We G wrote in his autobiography that he would tip 0:10:57.520 --> 0:11:00.360 the officers a dime to let him sleep a little long. Younger, 0:11:01.480 --> 0:11:04.160 he was finally able to find some work as a 0:11:04.200 --> 0:11:07.760 bus boy in an automatic restaurant. This was part time work. 0:11:07.800 --> 0:11:10.320 It was ten thirty am to two thirty pm, basically 0:11:10.360 --> 0:11:14.000 to cover the lunch hours, but it also included a 0:11:14.120 --> 0:11:18.240 light breakfast beforehand and then all the leftover unpurchased items 0:11:18.240 --> 0:11:20.360 when lunch was over, as well as being paid a 0:11:20.400 --> 0:11:23.240 dollar a day. This is a pretty good deal at 0:11:23.240 --> 0:11:25.520 the time. He spent twenty five cents a night to 0:11:25.559 --> 0:11:28.680 rent a room, and he spent the extra available time 0:11:28.760 --> 0:11:32.800 looking for more photography jobs. He claimed that he eventually 0:11:32.800 --> 0:11:36.199 got himself fired from the automatic job on purpose because 0:11:36.200 --> 0:11:38.040 he felt like as long as he stayed there he 0:11:38.120 --> 0:11:40.520 was doing well enough that he was not working as 0:11:40.559 --> 0:11:43.440 hard as he should to get a photography job. We 0:11:43.480 --> 0:11:45.520 don't really know if he got fired on purpose or 0:11:45.559 --> 0:11:48.080 if he got fired because he did something actually wrong, 0:11:48.320 --> 0:11:52.520 but he definitely lost the job. Uh And after that 0:11:52.600 --> 0:11:55.800 he took some day labor jobs, mostly in factories, until 0:11:55.880 --> 0:12:00.160 he found a job taking passport photos. He was really 0:12:00.200 --> 0:12:02.960 good at this passport job because he managed to sell 0:12:03.080 --> 0:12:06.640 people who only needed to photos for their travel documents 0:12:07.280 --> 0:12:11.320 entire baggages of portraits for twenty five dollars each. Having 0:12:11.320 --> 0:12:14.600 had multiple passport photos, I'm also impressed that they were 0:12:14.600 --> 0:12:17.640 photos anyone would want to half of themselves, right, I 0:12:17.679 --> 0:12:22.640 don't want more of those. His boss increased his salary 0:12:22.760 --> 0:12:25.680 from fifteen dollars a week to forty dollars, and he 0:12:25.720 --> 0:12:28.199 described this period in his life is living it up. 0:12:28.240 --> 0:12:31.000 He was a young man making great money, and he 0:12:31.120 --> 0:12:34.320 partied a lot. But after three years of the job 0:12:34.360 --> 0:12:37.400 at the Passport studio, twenty four year old Ushert took 0:12:37.400 --> 0:12:40.400 a fifty percent pay cut to start working at ACME 0:12:40.559 --> 0:12:45.320 News Pictures in and we will talk about Wegi's time 0:12:45.400 --> 0:12:52.720 at ACNE after we first pause for a sponsor break. 0:12:57.960 --> 0:13:00.560 We mentioned that we started at ACMEE New Pictures in 0:13:01.679 --> 0:13:03.960 and that was the year that ACMEE had started. It 0:13:04.040 --> 0:13:07.520 was a subsidiary of Scripps Howard and this was essentially 0:13:07.559 --> 0:13:10.040 set up to be an in house source of imagery 0:13:10.120 --> 0:13:12.920 for the scripts Howard News syndicate, including the New York 0:13:12.960 --> 0:13:16.240 Herald Tribune, and Usher was hired to work in the 0:13:16.320 --> 0:13:20.280 dark room, developing photos and making prints. He made it 0:13:20.360 --> 0:13:22.959 known that he wanted to be a photographer, but because 0:13:22.960 --> 0:13:25.600 he was unwilling to agree to the dress code of 0:13:25.679 --> 0:13:29.000 shirt and tie, he only got sent out on night jobs, 0:13:29.080 --> 0:13:33.240 kind of an emergency situations. This actually aligned pretty nicely though, 0:13:33.240 --> 0:13:36.319 with Usher's desires. He loved taking photos of New York's 0:13:36.400 --> 0:13:38.800 night happenings, and a lot of his work on those 0:13:38.800 --> 0:13:42.800 early assignments was taking pictures of fires. He was really 0:13:42.840 --> 0:13:46.040 glad to be shooting more dynamic moments instead of things 0:13:46.080 --> 0:13:49.440 like passport photos, and he recognized that working in the 0:13:49.520 --> 0:13:51.920 dark room had actually made him think about how his 0:13:51.960 --> 0:13:54.960 photos would develop, so he had a stronger eye for 0:13:55.080 --> 0:13:57.800 catching moments that if he had not been doing that job. 0:13:58.600 --> 0:14:01.080 He was working in the news photo business and a 0:14:01.120 --> 0:14:04.080 really unique time. He was seeing all of the events 0:14:04.080 --> 0:14:07.400 of the time as they developed under his hands. But 0:14:07.520 --> 0:14:12.600 he also saw the transition from flash powder to flash bulbs, 0:14:12.640 --> 0:14:16.200 and he saw the shifting roll of news photographer as 0:14:16.360 --> 0:14:20.840 subjects like presidents became important to capture. Keep in mind, 0:14:20.840 --> 0:14:24.000 it was only in the late nineteen teens that newspapers 0:14:24.040 --> 0:14:28.640 started running photographs with stories instead of illustrations, so it 0:14:28.680 --> 0:14:32.720 was really the start of the field of photojournalism. We 0:14:32.840 --> 0:14:35.600 do it later write that he and photography were growing 0:14:35.680 --> 0:14:38.440 up at the same time. He also saw during this 0:14:38.560 --> 0:14:42.920 work that speed was vital. Whichever outlets got their negatives 0:14:42.960 --> 0:14:47.240 to the telephone company's distribution offices first ensured that their 0:14:47.320 --> 0:14:49.920 credit was the one that the entire country would see. 0:14:50.680 --> 0:14:53.440 So while it act me, Usher came up with some 0:14:53.560 --> 0:14:57.240 fairly ingenious and slightly sneaky ways to get ahead of 0:14:57.240 --> 0:15:01.200 the competition. For example, he would ren an ambulance to 0:15:01.200 --> 0:15:03.440 go out on a job, then have it parked and 0:15:03.480 --> 0:15:06.400 waiting while the shots were being taken. And then when 0:15:06.400 --> 0:15:09.080 he finished photographing and he jumped back in the vehicle, 0:15:09.240 --> 0:15:12.080 the sirens were turned on and they could zip downtown 0:15:12.400 --> 0:15:15.640 while Usher developed the photos in the back of the ambulance. 0:15:16.640 --> 0:15:18.320 He knew if he got caught doing this, he was 0:15:18.320 --> 0:15:20.160 going to get in trouble, so he would change it 0:15:20.280 --> 0:15:23.520 up sometimes with things like taxis and trains and all 0:15:23.680 --> 0:15:27.440 was doing this mobile developing, which is pretty impressive. On 0:15:27.440 --> 0:15:29.840 one shoot, he said that he locked himself in an 0:15:29.840 --> 0:15:33.400 empty subway trains motorman's booth and developed the glass plate 0:15:33.480 --> 0:15:37.240 negative in there before he got to his stop. Also, 0:15:37.520 --> 0:15:40.880 unbeknownst to his bosses, Usher moved into the dark room 0:15:40.960 --> 0:15:43.920 at ACME. He kept the makings of a bed in 0:15:44.040 --> 0:15:46.720 his locker. He would pull them out at night after 0:15:46.760 --> 0:15:51.040 everybody left. He cooked out of cans on the engraver's stove, 0:15:51.320 --> 0:15:53.800 and he loved that he did not have any neighbors. 0:15:54.360 --> 0:15:57.960 After a lifetime of living in cramped rental spaces, he 0:15:58.040 --> 0:16:00.320 was actually pretty happy with this whole arrange. S mint 0:16:00.960 --> 0:16:03.760 he outed himself to his bosses. When the United Press 0:16:03.840 --> 0:16:07.240 ticker machine went off at four a m. On September 0:16:07.360 --> 0:16:12.200 three that was alerting news outlets to the crash of 0:16:12.240 --> 0:16:16.440 the Navy dirigible the USS Shenandoah, that crashed in Ohio. 0:16:17.040 --> 0:16:20.160 He decided the story was more important than his secret 0:16:20.240 --> 0:16:22.760 about living there in the dark room, so he called 0:16:22.760 --> 0:16:27.480 his bosses. So this ended his sleeping arrangements. But ACNE 0:16:27.480 --> 0:16:30.520 got photos from the crash site before anybody else, since 0:16:30.560 --> 0:16:33.440 all of the other news photographers got the message when 0:16:33.440 --> 0:16:36.360 they arrived at work in the morning, hours after Usher 0:16:36.400 --> 0:16:39.480 and his bosses had already ensured that a cameraman in 0:16:39.520 --> 0:16:42.400 Ohio could get the shot and then send it via 0:16:42.520 --> 0:16:46.640 train porter to New York. The other offshoot of having 0:16:46.680 --> 0:16:49.080 his squatting in the office suddenly out in the open 0:16:49.760 --> 0:16:52.080 was that his bosses actually realized he was pretty happy 0:16:52.080 --> 0:16:54.680 to take photography jobs at all hours. He was clearly 0:16:54.720 --> 0:16:57.240 a night owl, so when news broke outside of the 0:16:57.320 --> 0:17:00.160 usual nine to five workday, it just started to be 0:17:00.240 --> 0:17:02.320 Usher that they called instead of one of the regular 0:17:02.320 --> 0:17:05.960 staff photographers. He had an ear to the ground approach 0:17:06.080 --> 0:17:09.080 to getting shots of crime scenes, and he moved really 0:17:09.200 --> 0:17:12.080 fast to get to the sites and take the pictures. 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:16.320 And that's been said as something that led to that 0:17:16.480 --> 0:17:20.879 widely known moniker of Weiji. It's a phonetic version of 0:17:20.920 --> 0:17:25.840 the commonly mispronounced word wijia, and cops started calling Usher 0:17:26.359 --> 0:17:28.440 that because it seemed like he was psychic. He would 0:17:28.520 --> 0:17:31.360 show up at crime scenes even before the police got 0:17:31.359 --> 0:17:34.639 there on occasion, but according to Weigi himself, it was 0:17:34.720 --> 0:17:37.480 actually given to him by young women around the office. 0:17:37.880 --> 0:17:40.800 Either way, this name stuck and he liked it and 0:17:40.840 --> 0:17:44.040 he started using it. And after twelve years at ACME, 0:17:44.280 --> 0:17:47.160 Weigi was starting to feel restless and like his day 0:17:47.160 --> 0:17:50.159 to day had actually grown kind of scale. He was 0:17:50.200 --> 0:17:53.080 ready to do more photography of the things he chose, 0:17:53.240 --> 0:17:56.280 rather than waiting and hoping for assignments while he was 0:17:56.320 --> 0:18:00.119 developing the work of other photographers. So in five if 0:18:00.160 --> 0:18:03.040 he gave two weeks notice and once again returned to 0:18:03.119 --> 0:18:07.359 his freelance instincts. Because of his ears with Acme, Weigi 0:18:07.480 --> 0:18:10.520 knew the police around Manhattan, so as a freelancer he 0:18:10.600 --> 0:18:15.240 started hanging out at police headquarters. They didn't have press credentials, 0:18:15.359 --> 0:18:18.160 but cops had seen so much of him that they 0:18:18.200 --> 0:18:21.800 assumed that he did. He would actually pull the teletype 0:18:21.800 --> 0:18:24.440 slips off of the machines and then hand them over 0:18:24.480 --> 0:18:27.399 to police reporters, and so when they'd catch a story, 0:18:27.440 --> 0:18:30.199 he would just finagle a ride along with them. He 0:18:30.320 --> 0:18:33.160 later wrote of this time quote, crime was my oyster, 0:18:33.320 --> 0:18:36.919 and I liked it my post graduate course in life 0:18:36.960 --> 0:18:41.280 and photography. He also, somehow during this time, had finagled 0:18:41.320 --> 0:18:43.240 getting the key to the dark room at the New 0:18:43.320 --> 0:18:46.479 York Post, so he would develop his prints there and 0:18:46.480 --> 0:18:49.040 then he would give that outlet first DIBs on the 0:18:49.080 --> 0:18:51.200 shots that he had, and then he would make the 0:18:51.280 --> 0:18:55.000 rounds at other papers to sell his photos. He also 0:18:55.040 --> 0:18:57.600 wrote about this time why he felt his work was 0:18:57.640 --> 0:19:00.800 taking off and why those often grizzly images of people 0:19:00.800 --> 0:19:03.520 who had been shot or were in car accidents or 0:19:03.520 --> 0:19:06.879 we're trying to escape tenement fires were so appealing to readers. 0:19:07.320 --> 0:19:10.000 He wrote, quote, it was during the depression and people 0:19:10.040 --> 0:19:13.760 could forget their own troubles by reading about others. And 0:19:13.800 --> 0:19:17.280 Weiji was smart about hustling. And instances where there were 0:19:17.280 --> 0:19:20.000 photos with two people, like a cop in the man 0:19:20.080 --> 0:19:22.560 he had just arrested, Weji would cut the photo in 0:19:22.680 --> 0:19:25.720 half and sell each half as a separate image that 0:19:25.760 --> 0:19:29.679 would double his income. He also knew some papers wanted 0:19:29.760 --> 0:19:33.800 not just crime photos but also things like cute animal shots, 0:19:33.840 --> 0:19:36.520 so he cut deals with all the local fire stations 0:19:36.560 --> 0:19:39.360 to call him if any of their dogs ever had 0:19:39.359 --> 0:19:43.080 any litters. He would stage cute pictures of the mother 0:19:43.160 --> 0:19:47.840 and babies. He was basically always working as many angles 0:19:47.880 --> 0:19:50.960 as he could to sell as many photos as he could, 0:19:51.640 --> 0:19:54.280 and surprisingly he sold a lot of them to tabloids 0:19:54.280 --> 0:19:57.840 whose readers Wegi described as needing quote their daily blood 0:19:57.880 --> 0:20:00.399 bath and sex potion to go with the wreck fist. 0:20:00.960 --> 0:20:03.280 And though he had left Acne because he had gotten 0:20:03.320 --> 0:20:05.800 bored there he still had a really good relationship with them. 0:20:05.840 --> 0:20:08.560 He left on good terms, and he specifically had a 0:20:08.560 --> 0:20:12.040 good relationship with the photo editor there. He later said 0:20:12.080 --> 0:20:15.040 that he always saved the best photographs for ACME and 0:20:15.080 --> 0:20:17.040 that he knew he would always make a sale there. 0:20:17.680 --> 0:20:20.840 He later lamented, though, that he had been so good 0:20:20.880 --> 0:20:24.480 at providing such a steady stream of crime scene photos, 0:20:25.040 --> 0:20:29.920 editors got choosy, readers were less and less enthralled. Just 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:33.520 as his cash at was dwindling, he managed to get 0:20:33.520 --> 0:20:37.040 photos of a couple of teenagers, Gladys McKnight and her 0:20:37.040 --> 0:20:41.520 boyfriend who had committed a grizzly murder. Through his connections 0:20:41.560 --> 0:20:45.000 and a friends, he had been the only photographer allowed 0:20:45.040 --> 0:20:47.800 to meet and take photos of the couple. He sold 0:20:47.840 --> 0:20:51.440 these to every paper in town After that. His name 0:20:51.480 --> 0:20:54.800 on a photo byline had enough cloud that photo editors 0:20:54.840 --> 0:20:58.560 were no longer jaded with his crime scene shots. At 0:20:58.560 --> 0:21:01.359 some point he started stamp being his photo prints with 0:21:01.400 --> 0:21:06.080 the imprint by Weiji. The famous Life magazine even ran 0:21:06.160 --> 0:21:08.919 a story about Wigi and his work and his close 0:21:09.040 --> 0:21:13.000 ties to police headquarters. Yeah, those photographs are super duper 0:21:13.040 --> 0:21:16.840 weird um that he got of those teenagers Gladys and 0:21:16.880 --> 0:21:20.000 her boyfriend killed Gladys's mother in a very gruesome way. 0:21:20.280 --> 0:21:22.879 But the photos that he took of them looked like 0:21:23.000 --> 0:21:27.040 engagement photos. It's really creepy and weird. That's very creepy, 0:21:27.080 --> 0:21:30.680 it is, but it's why people all wanted to buy them. Uh. 0:21:30.720 --> 0:21:33.359 And that is how three years into his post Acme 0:21:33.480 --> 0:21:37.159 freelance career, Wegi, who had gotten famous at this point, 0:21:37.320 --> 0:21:40.760 got permission to install a police radio right in his 0:21:40.840 --> 0:21:43.920 own car. This meant that he was more or less 0:21:43.960 --> 0:21:46.879 guaranteed to always be the first photographer on site for 0:21:46.960 --> 0:21:51.840 any emergency murder, rescue, fire, or accident. He was able 0:21:51.880 --> 0:21:55.080 to get shots before crowds had even formed, adding to 0:21:55.119 --> 0:21:58.760 the intimacy of his lenses point of view. He turned 0:21:58.800 --> 0:22:01.800 his car, which was d H Chevy coupe, into a 0:22:01.880 --> 0:22:06.159 mobile photo studio. He carried camera equipment, protective gear, food, 0:22:06.240 --> 0:22:10.879 extra clothes, and even disguises in the trunk. In nineteen forty, 0:22:10.960 --> 0:22:15.040 he started working regularly with the magazine PM magazine. This 0:22:15.160 --> 0:22:18.119 was on a salary. That relationship lasted four and a 0:22:18.160 --> 0:22:20.800 half years, and during that time he got paid every 0:22:20.840 --> 0:22:24.119 week whether he brought in images or not. He was 0:22:24.160 --> 0:22:27.280 also given the freedom to make his own assignments. He 0:22:27.359 --> 0:22:30.480 worked with the Daily News, The Herald Tribune, the Sun, 0:22:30.640 --> 0:22:33.480 and as we mentioned the post, the decade of the 0:22:33.560 --> 0:22:37.480 nineteen forties was the apex of his career. In addition 0:22:37.480 --> 0:22:41.480 to those papers all pretty regularly purchasing photographs, The New 0:22:41.560 --> 0:22:44.920 York Photo League had also taken notice of Luigi's work, 0:22:45.320 --> 0:22:48.720 and in nineteen forty one, the organization staged an exhibit 0:22:48.800 --> 0:22:51.879