Famous Photography. And Stuff.

FAMOUS PHOTOGRAPHY. The 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines was the 2nd-largest volcanic eruption of the 20th century. Eruptive activity began on April 2 as a series of phreatic explosions from a fissure that opened on the north side. Seismic events happened for weeks. With a news crew, I covered some right in most hit areas. Tremors every 3 minutes, no power, a storm was raging. On our way back to Manila, a coup was rockin’ the city. ⛰🏝🌋

D-Day or Normandy landings. Airborne operations on 6 June 1944 of the Allied invasion of Normandy in Operation Overlord during World War II. Codenamed Operation Neptune, it was, and still is, the largest seaborne invasion in history. The operation began the liberation of France (and later Western Europe) and laid the foundations of the Allied victory on the Western Front. Memory of war that shouldn’t be repeated. War is doom. ☮️☮️☮️

FAMOUS MOMENTS. On 30 January 1969, the Beatles (with Billy Preston) performed an impromptu concert from the rooftop of their Apple Corps headquarters in central London. They played a 42-minute set before the Metropolitan Police ordered them to reduce the volume. It was the final public performance of their career. The shoot was directed by Michael Lindsay-Hogg. The photographer, Ethan Russell. 🎼🎸🎼

PHOTOGRAPHY of HORROR. On 6 and 9 August 1945, the United States detonated two atomic bombs over the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, respectively. The bombs killed an estimated 140,000 people in Hiroshima, and a further 74,000 in Nagasaki. In the years that followed, many of the survivors would face leukemia, cancer, or other terrible side effects from the radiation. ☮️☮️☮️

STRANGE PHOTOGRAPHS. While Americans are still inclined to think UFOs are not alien spacecraft, close to half believe alien life forms exist beyond Earth. A June 2019 poll found 49 percent of Americans believing there are "people somewhat like ourselves" living on other planets. A much larger percentage, 75 percent, said that "life of some form" exists elsewhere in the universe. This “UFO” was photographed in 1979 by Deputy Sheriff Val Johnson of Marshall County in northwestern Minnesota. 

       IN August of 1835, the New York Sun printed astronomical findings that detailed the discovery of life on the moon. The article was the first in a satirical series describing lunar pyramids, rivers, unicorns, bipedal beavers and bat-like people, all spied through a fictional seven-ton telescope in South Africa. The newspaper had underestimated the public’s gullibility. (Text: Smithsonian.) 🛸👽🛸

Photo credits: Albert Garcia. Army.mil. International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons.