Pouring Molten Steel from a Ladle in Ingot Molds, Otis Steel, Cleveland, c. 1935
Margaret Bourke-White was a trailblazing American photojournalist whose compelling images captured the industrial rise of Germany, the hardships of Depression-era America, and life inside 1930s Soviet Russia. Renowned for her fearless documentation of history, she was among the first to photograph the Nazi concentration camps at Erla and Buchenwald and took the final portraits of Mahatma Gandhi. Initially drawn to science, Bourke-White's path changed after a formative photography course with Clarence H. White, leading her to abandon zoology for the darkroom. After graduating from Cornell with a biology degree in 1927, she opened her first studio in Cleveland, producing striking images of architecture and industry that earned her national attention. Her talent led to a groundbreaking role as Fortune magazine’s first staff photographer and later to Life magazine, where her photograph of the Fort Peck Dam appeared on its inaugural cover in 1936.