Ernest Columbus Withers, Sr. (August 7, 1922 – October 15, 2007) was an African-American

photojournalist Photojournalism is journalism that uses images to tell a news story. It usually only refers to still images, but can also refer to video used in broadcast journalism. Photojournalism is distinguished from other close branches of photography (suc ...

. He documented over 60 years of African-American history in the segregated

Southern United States The Southern United States (sometimes Dixie, also referred to as the Southern States, the American South, the Southland, Dixieland, or simply the South) is List of regions of the United States, census regions defined by the United States Cens ...

, with iconic images of the

Montgomery bus boycott The Montgomery bus boycott was a political and social boycott, protest campaign against the policy of racial segregation on the public transit system of Montgomery, Alabama. It was a foundational event in the civil rights movement in the United ...

;

Emmett Till Emmett Louis Till (July 25, 1941 – August 28, 1955) was an African American youth, who was 14 years old when he was abducted and Lynching in the United States, lynched in Mississippi in 1955 after being accused of offending a white woman, ...

;

Memphis sanitation strike The Memphis sanitation strike began on February 12, 1968, in response to the deaths of sanitation workers Death of Echol Cole and Robert Walker, Echol Cole and Robert Walker. The deaths served as a breaking point for more than 1,300 African ...

;

Negro league baseball The Negro leagues were United States professional baseball leagues comprising teams of African Americans. The term may be used broadly to include professional black teams outside the leagues and it may be used narrowly for the seven relativel ...

; and musicians, including those related to

Memphis blues The Memphis blues is a style of blues music created from the 1910s to the 1930s by musicians in the Memphis area, such as Frank Stokes, Sleepy John Estes, Furry Lewis and Memphis Minnie. The style was popular in vaudeville and medicine sho ...

and

Memphis soul Memphis soul, also known as the Memphis sound, is the most prominent strain of Southern soul. It is a shimmering, sultry style produced in the 1960s and 1970s at Stax Records and Hi Records in Memphis, Tennessee, featuring melodic unison horn line ...

. Withers's work has been archived by the

Library of Congress The Library of Congress (LOC) is a research library in Washington, D.C., serving as the library and research service for the United States Congress and the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It also administers Copyright law o ...

and has been slated for the permanent collection of the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums, Education center, education and Research institute, research centers, created by the Federal government of the United States, U.S. government "for the increase a ...

National Museum of African American History and Culture The National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC), colloquially known as the Blacksonian, is a Smithsonian Institution museum located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., in the United States. It was established in 2003 an ...

, in Washington, D.C.

Early life

Ernest Columbus Withers was born in

Memphis, Tennessee Memphis is a city in Shelby County, Tennessee, United States, and its county seat. Situated along the Mississippi River, it had a population of 633,104 at the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, making it the List of municipalities in Tenne ...

, to Arthur Withers and Pearl Withers of Marshall County, Mississippi; he had a step-mother known as Mrs. Minnie Withers. Withers exhibited interest in photography from a young age. He took his first photograph in high school after his sister gave him a camera she received from a classmate. He met his wife Dorothy Curry of

Brownsville, Tennessee Brownsville is a city in and the county seat of Haywood County, Tennessee, United States. Its population as of the 2020 census was 9,788. The city is named after General Jacob Jennings Brown, an American officer of the War of 1812. History Brow ...

(they remained married for 66 years), at

Manassas High School Manassas High School is in Memphis, Tennessee. It was established in 1900. As of 2022, the school had about 420 students 96 percent of whom were black. The high school produced several prominent jazz musicians. In the 1920s, it was one of two hi ...

in Memphis, Tennessee. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, he received training at the Army School of Photography. After the war, Withers served as one of Memphis' first African-American police officers.

Personal life

Withers and his wife Dorothy had eight children together (seven boys and one girl, Rosalind Withers). He also had a second daughter from Memphis, Tennessee, named Frances Williams. All of his sons accompanied him as apprentice photographers at different points in his career, including Ernest, Jr., Perry O., Clarence (Joshua), E., Wendell J., Dedrick (Teddy) J., Dyral L., and Andrew (Rome). His business was called Withers Photography Studio. Withers enjoyed traveling, visiting family members and entertaining guests at his home, including

Brock Peters Brock Peters (born George Fisher; July 2, 1927 – August 23, 2005) was an American actor, best known for playing the villainous "Crown" in the 1959 film version of ''Porgy and Bess'', and Tom Robinson in the 1962 film ''To Kill a Mockingbird ...

Jim Kelly James Edward Kelly (born February 14, 1960) is an American former professional football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 11 seasons with the Buffalo Bills. He also spent two seasons with the Houston Gamblers o ...

Eartha Kitt Eartha Mae Kitt (née Keith; January 17, 1927 – December 25, 2008) was an American singer and actress. She was known for her highly distinctive singing style and her 1953 recordings of "C'est si bon" and the Christmas novelty song "Santa Baby" ...

Alex Haley Alexander Murray Palmer Haley (August 11, 1921 – February 10, 1992) was an American writer and the author of the 1976 book '' Roots: The Saga of an American Family.'' ABC adapted the book as a television miniseries of the same name and ...

, Ivan van Sertima,

Stokley Carmichael Kwame Ture (; born Stokely Standiford Churchill Carmichael; June 29, 1941November 15, 1998) was an American activist who played a major role in the civil rights movement in the United States and the global pan-African movement. Born in Trinid ...

(Kwame Ture), and many others from the entertainment world and black consciousness movement. He attended Gospel Temple Baptist Church in Memphis, Tennessee. He was also an all-round (high-school to professional) sports enthusiast.

Career

Withers was active for approximately 60 years, with his most noted work being the images captured of the Civil Rights Movement. He traveled with

Martin Luther King Jr. Martin Luther King Jr. (born Michael King Jr.; January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister, civil and political rights, civil rights activist and political philosopher who was a leader of the civil rights move ...

during his public life. Withers's coverage of the Emmett Till murder trial brought national attention to the racial violence taking place during the 1950s in Mississippi, among other places. Withers appeared in a TV documentary about the murdered 14-year-old entitled ''The American Experience: The Murder of Emmett Till''. Withers served as official photographer for

Stax Records Stax Records is an American record company, originally based in Memphis, Tennessee. Founded in 1957 as Satellite Records, the label changed its name to Stax Records in September 1961. It also shared its operations with sister label Volt Records. ...

for 20 years. Between 1 million and 5 million images are estimated to have been taken during Withers's career, with current efforts in progress for preservation and digitization.

Death

In 2007, Withers died from the complications of a

stroke Stroke is a medical condition in which poor cerebral circulation, blood flow to a part of the brain causes cell death. There are two main types of stroke: brain ischemia, ischemic, due to lack of blood flow, and intracranial hemorrhage, hemor ...

in his hometown of Memphis.

FBI informant

In 2013, the FBI released documents relating to Withers in response to a

Freedom of Information Act Freedom of Information Act may refer to the following legislations in different jurisdictions which mandate the national government to disclose certain data to the general public upon request: * Freedom of Information Act (United States) of 1966 * F ...

(FOIA) request by a Memphis newspaper, ''

The Commercial Appeal ''The Commercial Appeal'' (also known as the ''Memphis Commercial Appeal'') is a daily newspaper of Memphis, Tennessee, and its surrounding metropolitan area. It is owned by the Gannett Company; its former owner, the E. W. Scripps Company, also ...

''. The FBI documents start in 1946 with the FBI investigating Withers as a possible

communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

, as he was a member of the United Negro Allied Veterans of America (UNAVA) after serving in

, and the group was alleged by the FBI at the time to have communist ties. The FBI investigation of Withers as a potential communist extended through 1948, concluding with their outreach to an "informant" labeled T-3 that provided information that Withers no longer had ties to the United Negro Allied Veterans of America. ME 338-R was referenced as an "informant" for two years, 1968 through the final report in 1970, with 19 reports that include some reference to the informant. A total of 10 pictures were provided by the informant in the released documents. A 1968 document contains the first reference to an informant, ME 338-R, a reference to Withers and inferred by the FBI's responses to FOIA court actions. ME 338-R was questioned and queried for general information, and provided a total of approximately 10 photographs alongside brief descriptions of publicly known meetings and events. There is limited specific information, commonly relating to a militant group named the Invaders. ME 338-R recorded the violence and connections of the Invaders including a leaflet on the manufacturing of firebombs, and links to prostitution. Withers died years before the FOIA request was made. At the 2000 Withers exhibition at the

Chrysler Museum of Art The Chrysler Museum of Art is an art museum on the border between downtown and the Ghent district of Norfolk, Virginia. The museum was founded in 1933 as the Norfolk Museum of Arts and Sciences. In 1971, automotive heir, Walter P. Chrysler Jr ...

in Norfolk, Virginia, Withers said he had FBI agents regularly looking over his shoulder and questioning him. "I never tried to learn any high powered secrets," Withers said. "It would have just been trouble.…

he FBI He or HE may refer to: Language * He (letter), the fifth letter of the Semitic abjads * He (pronoun), a pronoun in Modern English * He (kana), one of the Japanese kana (へ in hiragana and ヘ in katakana) * Ge (Cyrillic), a Cyrillic letter cal ...

was pampering me to catch whatever leaks I dropped, so I stayed out of meetings where decisions were being made". Civil rights leader

Andrew Young Andrew Jackson Young Jr. (born March 12, 1932) is an American politician, diplomat, and activist. Beginning his career as a pastor, Young was an early leader in the civil rights movement, serving as executive director of the Southern Christia ...

commented after the release of the FBI file: "The movement was transparent and didn't have anything to hide anyway". A later book authored by Preston Lauterbauch discussed Withers brief encounter with the FBI, and explained that he likely saw the federal government, and thus the FBI, as protection at that moment for the civil rights movement, as the FBI had helped the movement in Memphis in a voting discrimination case, which Withers covered through photography. It was also the federal government that deployed the National Guard to protect the

Little Rock Nine The Little Rock Nine were a group of nine African American students enrolled in Little Rock Central High School in 1957. Their enrollment was followed by the Little Rock Crisis, in which the students were initially prevented from entering th ...

, which was also photographed and witnessed by Withers. A member of the Invaders, John B. Smith, to which Withers was apparently provided information, harshly criticized the initial reporting on Withers' FBI ties and remarked, "I think he deserves a statue somewhere".

Ernest Withers Museum and Collection

The Ernest Withers Museum and Collection opened in Memphis, Tennessee, on

Beale Street Beale Street is a street in Downtown Memphis, Tennessee, which runs from the Mississippi River to East Street, a distance of approximately . It is a significant location in the city's history, as well as in the history of blues music. Today, ...

in May 2011. The Museum features images of Ernest Withers spanning the eras of his work, while the complete archive is held in an offsite location. The Withers Museum and Collection is approximately 7,000 square feet.

Publications

* * * * * *

References

External links

"Withers Collection Museum and Gallery"
- Official Withers Collection Museum and Gallery Website
Obituary in ''The Times''
October 27, 2007

- Op-ed by ''

USA Today ''USA Today'' (often stylized in all caps) is an American daily middle-market newspaper and news broadcasting company. Founded by Al Neuharth in 1980 and launched on September 14, 1982, the newspaper operates from Gannett's corporate headq ...

''
"Civil Rights Photographer Recast As FBI Informant"
- slideshow by ''

NPR National Public Radio (NPR) is an American public broadcasting organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It serves as a national Radio syndication, syndicator to a network of more ...

''
"Ernest Withers and the FBI"
- Published FBI Reports Related to Ernest Withers * ''Tri State Defender'', September 2010 edition, front page. {{DEFAULTSORT:Withers, Ernest African-American photographers American photojournalists American sports photographers 1922 births 2007 deaths Mass media people from Memphis, Tennessee Law enforcement officials from Tennessee Memphis blues American municipal police officers Journalists from Tennessee Federal Bureau of Investigation informants 20th-century American journalists American male journalists 20th-century African-American people 21st-century African-American people United States Army personnel of World War II