[Congressional Record Volume 140, Number 20 (Tuesday, March 1, 1994)]
[Senate]
[Page S]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]


[Congressional Record: March 1, 1994]
From the Congressional Record Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]

 
                         DEATH OF GEORGE TAMES

  Mr. MOYNIHAN. Mr. President, I rise today to recognize the passing of 
a most gifted and decent friend. George Tames, for many decades the New 
York Times' uniquely talented photographer, died this past Thursday.
  George Tames' work spanned 10 administrations, and he possessed the 
unique ability to capture life's most telling moments, forever.
  My thoughts and prayers are with Mr. Tames' family and friends.
  The February 24, 1994, edition of the New York Times printed a kind 
memorial to this uncommon artist. Mr. President, at this time I ask 
that my statement and the following obituary be included in the Record.
  There being no objection, the obituary was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                [From the New York Times, Feb. 24, 1994]

                 George Tames, Photographer, Dies at 75

                           (By David Binder)

       Washington, February. 23.--George Tames, a news 
     photographer for more than half a century whose work changed 
     the way Americans looked at Presidents and political power, 
     died here today while undergoing heart surgery. He was 75.
       His photographs chronicled 10 Presidents from Franklin D. 
     Roosevelt to George Bush, countless members of Congress and 
     visiting statesmen from Churchill to Khrushchev. President 
     Eisenhower chose two Tames photographs for official 
     portraits, and a third became a 6-cent Eisenhower stamp.
       The photo for the stamp was a characteristic Tames shot, 
     taken of Eisenhower in 1953 in an unguarded moment as the 
     President was delivering a radio-television address 
     announcing that a truce had been agreed to ending the Korean 
     War.
       Over the years Mr. Tames also won awards and citations for 
     dramatic action shots of a farmers' protest, a civil rights 
     march and a still life of the Lincoln Memorial. The bulk of 
     his work was for The New York Times, which he joined in 1945, 
     after six years with Time magazine. That was the era of the 
     large Speed Graphic camera, which shot only one frame at a 
     time. He retired from The Times 40 years later in the era of 
     the .35 millimeter camera with high-speed shutters and large, 
     fast lenses.


                          kennedy at his desk

       Mr. Tames was a keen student of Washington's changing 
     political culture, early on, he developed an instinct for 
     capturing dramatic moments on film.
       One of his most widely known photographs showed a 
     silhouette of President Kennedy from the back, leaning on his 
     desk in the Oval Office and visibly burdened by the weight of 
     his job. It was the kind of picture that Mr. Tames could find 
     and shoot because of his ability to develop easy and informal 
     access to the powerful.
       ``Mine was an unofficial role in his political kingdom,'' 
     Mr. Tames recalled in his memoir, ``Eye on Washington,'' 
     published in 1990, ``that of jokester and bringer of news, 
     rumors and spicy Capitol Hill gossip.''
       Knowing that Kennedy often worked standing up because of an 
     injured back and that his door was often open, Mr. Tames saw 
     the President bent over, reading something in a newspaper. 
     ``I deliberately underexposed,'' he said later. ``I wanted 
     the blackness, the mood that I saw with my eye.''


                           `posterity's spy'

       In a tribute two years ago on the occasion of the National 
     Press Club's Fourth Estate award to the photographer, Ken 
     Burns, the documentary film maker, spoke of Mr. Tames's work 
     as ``pictures that last, that speak eloquently, that have and 
     will endure, that clearly are the DNA of our political story 
     in the last 50 years.''
       Mr. Burns said Mr. Tames was ``posterity's spy--a mole--
     penetrating farther and much deeper into our political 
     landscape and psyche than any reporter who hangs on words 
     has.''
       George Tames was born on Jan. 21, 1919, a few blocks from 
     the Capitol. He was the son of Greek-Albanian immigrants; his 
     father was a pushcart peddler. In the Depression, when the 
     large Tames family depended heavily on relief, President 
     Roosevelt was venerated in their back-alley home, his 
     photograph placed alongside those of St. George and the 
     Virgin Mother next to candles on an icon stand.
       George was introduced to the Capitol early in his life. He 
     had to work after completing the 10th grade and he began as 
     an office courier for Time-Life, which took him back to 
     Capitol Hill.
       The work of news photographers attracted him, although at 
     the time cameramen were not allowed to roam the Congressional 
     corridors. But he was soon permitted to make photographs of 
     individual members of Congress, and by the end of World War 
     II he was among a small number of photographers permitted to 
     take pictures of Roosevelt.
       Although Mr. Tames had a deep affection for President 
     Kennedy, President Truman was undoubtedly his favorite, not 
     the least because he was the first to treat photographers 
     with respect.
       Mr. Tames relished the recollection of the day Truman 
     ``made White House photographers first-class citizens'' by 
     freeing them from the confines of a tiny West Wing chamber 
     they called the Doghouse, and giving them entree to the press 
     room.
       Mr. Tames recalled Truman telling a foreign dignitary: ``I 
     am President of the most powerful nation in the world. I take 
     orders from nobody, except photographers.''
       Mr. Tames had a wiry build and always seeming to be on the 
     move around a city he loved. He was a tireless raconteur, 
     telling anecdotes he had shared with the high and mighty, 
     capped with a raucous laugh. This was a part of the persona 
     he cultivated that made him popular not only with the 
     politicians he covered, but also with his colleagues.
       They celebrated him at 14 retirement parties, starting in 
     1986, after which everyone lost count. But Mr. Tames did not 
     really retire. He went on shooting pictures as a freelance, 
     mainly for The Times, and when a colleague or a colleague's 
     child got married, he happily volunteered to make the wedding 
     pictures, asking only for the cost of the film and permission 
     to dance with the bride.
       He was usually the life of any party he attended, ``He's 
     the champion,'' Cornell Capa, a former Life photographer, 
     said a decade ago, ``He beats everybody.''
       In a tribute to Mr. Tames, Wally Bennett, a longtime 
     Washington photographer for Time, said today: ``He knew all 
     the players in the political game. He did his background 
     work. He had a marvelous eye. He used his knowledge to make 
     marvelous photographs that will be in the history books.''
       Mr. Tames is survived by his wife, the former Frances Faye 
     Owens; two sons, Chris, of Nags Head, N.C., and Michael G., 
     of Manteo, N.C.; three daughters, Pamale Tames Goodman of 
     Wilson, N.C., Kathryn Tames Walton of Springfield, Va., and 
     Stephanie Tames Nelson of Statesboro, Ga.

                          ____________________