[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 67 (Tuesday, May 20, 1997)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E980]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     SPECIAL TRIBUTE TO HONOR THE LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENTS OF RETIRED 
                     PHOTOGRAPHER, MAURICE SORRELL

                                 ______
                                 

                       HON. ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON

                      of the district of columbia

                    in the house of representatives

                         Tuesday, May 20, 1997

  Ms. NORTON. Mr. Speaker, Maurice Sorrell, a native Washingtonian, has 
been involved in photography in the D.C. area since the early 1950's. 
His interest in this medium was piqued as he observed his uncles, both 
amateur photographers, taking pictures of his parents. In 1947, 
determined to develop his skills, Mr. Sorrell enrolled in a 3-year 
photography course at the Department of Agriculture Graduate School 
which he completed in 2 years.
  Mr. Speaker, in 1957, Mr. Sorrell was hired by the Pentagon as a 
photographer. As a result of discrimination, however, he was only 
permitted to work in the dark room. Maurice Sorrell left the Pentagon 
to work full-time as a freelance photographer and also worked as a 
photographer for the Johnson Publishing Co. Mr. Sorrell served as a 
mentor, colleague, and friend to the Exposure Group--the African 
American Photographers Association, Inc. in Washington, DC.
  Mr. Speaker, Maurice Sorrell's photographs of black events graced the 
pages of the Washington Afro-American Newspaper. In 1961, through the 
efforts of the late Art Carter, publisher of the Afro-American 
Newspaper, and the late Louis Lautier, a national congressional 
correspondent, Mr. Sorrell was the first black photographer to gain 
admittance to the prestigious White House News Photographers 
Association. Mr. Sorrell traveled to more than 24 countries including 
14 countries in Africa. He shot the World Series as well as NFL 
sporting events. He photographed inmates on death row and in the gas 
chamber at a Federal prison in North Carolina. He traveled aboard Air 
Force One and covered six Presidents. Maurice Sorrell traveled 
throughout the South with Lady Bird Johnson taking pictures of 
``poverty.'' He covered the march to Selma, AL. He was in Memphis, TN, 
covering the garbage worker's strike when Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., 
was assassinated. It was Maurice Sorrell who took the first group 
photograph of the Congressional Black Caucus.
  Mr. Speaker, I ask that this body join me in a salute to this 
photographer, this historian and the magnificent sum of his 
accomplishments.

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