Margaret Bourke Research Paper

Margaret Bourke-White was born on June 24,1904, to Joseph and Minnie White in Bronx, New York. As a young child Margaret was brought into this world as one of the white’s three offspring. Her father was an engineer who valued photography and all that it could capture; whereas, her mother defied stereotypes and became one of the few women ,during that time, to have an education. Graduating from Plainfield High School in Union City, Bourke disregarded her photographic interests and attended Columbia university to study herpetology. There was a brief lapse in time where Bourke showed no interest in photography after her father’s passing in 1922. Following this event Bourke transferred to the University of Michigan. Noticing her daughter’s need

During one of Bourke’s journeys across the Atlantic Ocean to reach North Africa, her transport ship was torpedoed and sunk. Despite this life threatening event Bourke continued her journey to notify the world of what it had become. Following her accident, Bourke ventured to italy where she began covering the daily life of infantrymen in the Italian campaign. Toward the latter end of World War II Bourke joined General George Patton’s third army troops in Germany where she captured the horrific scene of holocaust camps and corpses in gas chambers. As her journey in Germany came to a close, Margaret found herself in India photographing Mohandas Gandhi’s peaceful protest and the migration it provoked. Following this event Margaret’s work led her to South Korea where she seized pictures of the Korean War. After being diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease in 1952 Margaret continued to live her life, later writing a book entitled Portrait of Myself(1963). In 1969 Margaret retired from Life magazine ,two years later Margaret suffered an injury that rendered her immobile contributing to her death on August 27,1971, in Stamford,