The first camera was invented in the early 1800s, and since then it has been used to capture millions of moments in history.
At the time, the camera was the size of a room and required numerous people to handle and operate, and now today everyone owns a camera that can fit in the pocket of their jeans. Photography has come a long way since its invention and people have studied and practiced the skill. Photos are the best way to preserve memories, and they’re excellent ways for us to learn about our past, especially if we weren’t alive yet to live through it.
Reddit user Curlaub asked people what they thought is the single greatest photograph in history. The question garnered over 20,000 responses, all with people sharing their different picks.
It was a question that immediately caught my eye.
History was always a topic I loved to study during school. So after going through many of the responses I took to the internet to do a little research behind what was going on when that moment of time was captured by the photographer. The photos themselves are beautiful and powerful, while often times the stories behind them are truly haunting.
Seeing The Realities Of Modern Medicine, A.K.A 23 Hour Surgeries
Reddit user augburto referenced National Geographic’s best picture of 1987, according to an article from ZME Science. Seen in the photo is Polish surgeon Dr. Zbigniew Religa as he is keeping watch of his patient’s vital signs. The photo was snapped just after Dr. Religa conducted a 23 hour heart transplant surgery. You can see a colleague who helped him during the surgery asleep in the lower right-hand corner of the photo. At the time, this type of surgery was thought to be impossible, but Dr. Religa went ahead with it anyway and the operation was extremely successful.
Below is the photo from the surgery.
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The following image is of the patient, Tadeusz Zitkevitz, holding that iconic photograph 25 years after his heart transplant surgery.
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Zitkevitz went on to outlive the doctors who performed the transplant on him.
Photos Where People Have Been Saved From Death
The photo in question reddit user welliwanttowelliwant mentioned is a truly emotional one. This was a moment in history that was presumably snapped by a solider from the 743rd Tank Battalion, although the official author of the image is still unknown. It was taken near Farsleben, Germany on April 13th, 1945, the final year of WWII.
Seen in the photo are several Jewish prisoners, mainly women and children, escaping a cargo train during the Holocaust.
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In the foreground is a woman gripping the hand of her daughter, relief and tears obvious on her face. Behind them is a woman with her arms outstretched, posing for the camera, with a massive grin on her face, knowing her life had just been saved. They were on a train headed east, further into Germany, from the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp where they would have been executed at the train’s final destination.
An Image That Makes You Immediately Breakout Into An Anxious Sweat
The highest-voted image in the thread was shared by reddit user that-one-man. Seen in the photo is astronaut Bruce McCandless II floating UNTETHERED in Space.
That’s right, untethered. In. Space. Where there is NOTHING to catch you. Terrifying, right?
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The stunning photo was snapped from the flight deck by fellow astronauts on February 7th, 1984 during the NASA Space Shuttle Challenger’s STS-41B mission. And on this day, astronaut Bruce McCandless II made the “first, untethered, free flight spacewalk.” During his famous spacewalk, he said to mission control “It may have been a small step for Neil [Armstrong], but it’s a heck of a big leap for me.”
A Perfectly-Timed, Yet Haunting Sign From The Universe
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Reddit user YouKnowABitJonSnow shared an image of a British Army Explosive Ordnance Disposal Technical Officer (a.k.a a bomb disposal specialist) approaching a suspicious device at an intersection in Belfast, Northern Ireland in the 1970s.
On the wall of a nearby building is a sign that reads “Prepare to meet thy God,” a quote from the Old Testament (Amos 4:12).
It’s a morbid sign to read as you’re slowly approaching an improvised and unstable explosive device that could potentially end your life in a single moment. Luckily, this particular moment ended on a positive note and the specialist in this photo was not killed as the bomb did not detonate.
Thinking About Our World In The Perspective Of The Universe Will Break Your Brain
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Reddit user WannaWaffle commented the image of the first Hubble Deep Field. This small sample of sky was captured by R. Williams, the Hubble Deep Field Team, and NASA/ESA back on January 15th, 1996. This photo is “one of the deepest, most detailed visible views of the universe.”
The telescope was only covering an extremely small portion of our sky, roughly the width of a dime that is 75 feet away #science.
Another reddit user, Why-so-delirious replied to the original comment with some context of what the Deep Field is:
And within this small field, Hubble discovered a wide assortment of at least 1,500 galaxies, all at different stages in their life cycles. 1,500 galaxies. Seen within the width of a DIME. And that’s what we would see every time we looked at a different portion of the sky.
Again, for emphasis, these are galaxies. Not solar systems.
If I think about this any longer I’m going to have an existential crisis. No one truly knows just how many solar systems are within our galaxy (The Milky Way), but some scientists estimate there could be around 100,000,000,000. All in all, it’s very unsettling to think about, let alone look at.
The Burning Monk, 1963
Reddit user Curlaub shared an image of the infamous burning monk taken in 1963 Vietnam. Disclaimer: the photo is very graphic and viewer discretion is advised. If you wish to see the photo, click here. Before and after photos of the moment are also included in the link.
For those who of you who don’t wish to click the link, here is some verbal context behind the moment.
In June of 1963 a Vietnamese Mahayana Buddhist monk named Thích Quang Duc sat in the middle of a busy intersection and set himself on fire, where he eventually burned to death as a form of protest. Fellow monks and nuns, and even regular bystanders going about their day, stood and watched in stunned silence. He was protesting the pro-catholic policies and discrimination of Buddhist laws that were happening in South Vietnam at the time, even though Buddhists made up roughly 70-90% of the nation’s population.
Quang Duc wrote his last words in a letter saying, “before closing my eyes and moving towards the vision of the Buddha, I respectfully plead to President Ngo Dinh Diem to take a mind of compassion towards the people of the nation and implement religious equality to maintain the strength of the homeland eternally. I call the venerables, reverends, members of the sangha and the lay Buddhists to organize in solidarity to make sacrifices to protect Buddhism.” The entire self-immolation took around 10 minutes to complete before his body was wrapped in yellow robes and carried away.
A Photo No One Else Would Think To Take On 9/11
Reddit user SnackPatrol replied to the burning monk comment with a similar version of “craziness happening before people’s eyes.” It was the moment hundreds of people stood in the streets of Lower Manhattan and watched as the South Tower of the World Trade Center collapsed on the morning of 9/11.
Watching 9/11 from a different perspective.
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Photographer Patrick Witty captured this moment at 9:58 a.m. on September 11th, 2001. What brings everyone together in this photo are the same expressions of absolute disbelief and terror as they all look up and watch helpless from the streets below. As reddit user ecodude74 replied, it’s a moment the average person wouldn’t think to do in a world-changing moment of chaos.
To turn your back to the event and instead capture the people who witnessed the tragedy. It’s only something a true photographer would do.
In a TIME article, Patrick Witty shared his thoughts behind taking the photo. What’s horrifying is the third man seen in the foreground, the one with the glasses, was identified as Benjamin Tabile, a businessman who was scheduled to have an interview in the World Trade Center towers that morning. Instead, he was running late for his interview. Tabile said to Witty, “As I walked out of the subway, I saw the building on fire and didn’t know why,” he said. “I was in complete shock. I would have been in that building while the planes hit.”
Watching People Confront Human Atrocities
Reddit user sasshole14 shared an image taken just after WWII ended in 1945. This is the moment the camera was turned away from the screen and instead captured the audiences’ reactions. In this image, we see the faces of German POWs, who were captured by Americans, having to watch footage of a concentration camp.
This was the Allies’ policy of trying to purge Germany of any remaining remnants of Nazi rule.
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This method was called “forced confrontation,” which brought Germans face-to-face with some of the worst and most horrifying acts brought on by the Third Reich. These films contained footage ranging from piles of Jewish bodies in mass graves to a prisoner’s debilitating case of trench foot. Expressions seen here are ones of grief and shame, understanding and facing just how atrocious some of the acts carried out by the Third Reich were.
One Man’s Protest
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Reddit user xX_ElonMusk_420_Xx commented the iconic photo of the “Tank Man” during the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989. These protests took place during the early months of 1989 in Beijing, China. The Tiananmen Square protests were a student-led demonstration that called on China for democracy, free speech, and free press. Eventually, the protests were suppressed at 1 a.m. on June 4th, 1989 by the Chinese government. This led to a massive massacre of civilians, which formally became known as the Tiananmen Square Massacre.
It was estimated that several hundreds to thousands of protesters were killed by the military and over 10,000 arrested.
The unidentified man seen in the iconic “Tank Man” photo was captured on camera by Jeff Widener on June 5th, the day following the massacre. He stood alone, in defiance, and blocked a column of tanks as they were trying to leave the square. This image and those from the protests and massacre were smuggled out of China and gained international attention. That man became renowned as the “Tiananmen Square Tank Man.” The fate of the man, to this day, is unknown.
“Photos Are Only Half-Truths”
Reddit user kazr891 shared the story behind the photo of General Nguyen executing a Viet Cong prisoner during the Vietnam War. There was actually a lesson to be learned from this photo. Often times we won’t seek out the context of what is put in front of us. We see what we see and formulate our own opinions and create our own story without researching further.
And that is exactly what happened with this photo, shot by Eddie Adams, who later regretted taking this Pulitzer-prize winning photograph.
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This photo captured the exact moment of death for the prisoner. And so, the initial reaction and assumption is the man (Brigadier General Nguyen Ngoc Loan) with the gun is the “bad guy.” And because of this assumption, it became one of the most influential images from the Vietnam War by really driving how brutal and unwinnable this war was for America. The prisoner, a suspected Viet Cong squad leader, Nguyen Van Lem, was caught by South Vietnamese military personnel at the site of a mass grave containing more than 30 civilian bodies. He was also believed to have murdered the wife and six children of one of the General’s colleagues.
For years, Adams was haunted by the aftermath of taking this photo.
So in turn, the prisoner was the bad guy. But it’s not something that is obvious just from looking at the photo. And yet, it was used to fuel a false narrative. And for the rest of the General Loan’s life, the idea of hate and evil followed him until he died of cancer in 1998. At an awards ceremony Adams regretfully said “I was getting money for showing one man killing another. Two lives were destroyed, and I was getting paid for it. I was a hero.”
The Last Of A Dying Species
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This photo will serve you well if you’re in need of a good cry today. Species extinction is becoming an all too common appearance in our headlines lately. Reddit user HappyAstronomer reminded us of when the last male Northern White Rhino on Earth died back in 2018 due to age-related complications. There are only two female Northern White Rhinos left on Earth, both of whom are his direct descendants. 45-year-old Sudan, the name of the Rhino, is seen just moments before his passing with his handler, Zachariah Mutai, comforting him.
It’s likely the species will become extinct after Sudan’s passing, but scientists are still hopeful.
Efforts to save the species began nearly a decade ago. Illegal poaching was not slowing down, and at that time only eight northern white rhinos were left on Earth, all of whom were in captivity. Sudan and three others were brought to Kenya in hopes of breeding them, but ultimately failed. Now, scientists are considering stem cell procedures and harvesting eggs from Sudan’s two female descendants. They’re hoping Sudan’s passing serves as a wake-up call for the rest of us.
A Sunset On A Different Planet
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If you’re ready to have your mind blown again, Reddit user Jayj343 shared what a sunset looks like on Mars. This particular Martian sunset was captured by NASA’s Spirit Mars rover on May 9th, 2005. However, it is not the first sunset we’ve seen on Mars, but it is the first time we’ve seen what the sun looks like from the little red planet.
The sun only appears about two-thirds the size we see here on Earth. Because Mars is heckin’ far away.
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On August 21st, 1976, NASA’s Viking 1 lander gave us a peek at the first sunset fading on red soil. Doesn’t it just look so warm and cozy? We all know Mars as the red planet, thanks to iron oxide in the soil, so why the differing colors in these two sunset images? In the photo from 2005, the blueish hue in the Martian sky is due to fine dust, which in turn makes the area near the Sun a much more prominent shade of blue, while during the day we see the typical rust color.
Photos That Make You Wonder What Happened To The Person Behind The Camera
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Reddit user Thuxedo shared an anxiety-inducing photo of a single truck in the distance fleeing a monstrous plume of hot volcanic ash. This iconic photo was shot on June 12th, 1991 in the Philippines. Mount Pinatubo had just erupted, making it the second-largest volcanic eruption of the century. A 7.8-magnitude earthquake about 60 miles away from the volcano had struck and ultimately triggered the volcano to erupt.
Before then, the volcano had been dormant for nearly 500 years.
This site is one straight out of a doomsday film, and Alberto Garcia is the photographer who captured this terrifying moment. He was interviewed back in 2014 and asked to recount his experience during the eruption. At the time, he was stationed only 20-30 kilometers away from the volcano, and it was when tall plumes of hot ash came raining down he jumped in a truck to hopefully get away. It was then when he saw the blue truck seen in the photo behind him. He managed to capture the moment from the open door of a speeding truck on a dirt road. Eventually, they outran the hot ash. Garcia later said, “I knew we might die and before I die, I wanted to tell a story using my camera.”
A Young Girl Realizing The World Is So Much More
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It’s an image that really stops you in your tracks and makes you think. Reddit user lylefk shared this photo of a young girl at a Veteran’s Day school assembly watching her grandfather breakdown into tears. Something I always remember from my childhood is hardly seeing the adults in my family cry.
The world didn’t feel heavy to me yet, like there was nothing beyond my little bubble of happy experiences.
I was young, but I still remember vividly when my grandfather on my dad’s side was dying and my dad received the phone call. He sat across the living room in his desk chair and stared up at the ceiling and cried. I’d never seen him do that. This was also the first time I had experienced anyone close to me die. Until then, I didn’t think adults ever experienced emotions outside happiness, that nothing could truly hurt them.
That childhood innocence goes away once that little bubble bursts.
What’s so haunting about this image of the young girl is that we’re seeing a bit of that childhood innocence fade away for the first time. She’s watching a person in her life who she probably looks up to and admires show such a strong emotion she’s probably never seen him express before. Maybe I’m just a little too empathetic, but watching someone cry changes me a little bit every time. Empathy or not, it’s still a haunting image.
