“Documentary photographers all have a common characteristic. They are curious yet objective. They search with inquisitive zeal for the essence of nature and events. They examine and scrutinize to reveal the truth.”

— Arthur Rothstein

Arthur Rothstein, a photojournalist, is recognized for his five-decade career. His photographs provoked and entertained the American public with images of everything from hometown baseball games to war, struggling farmers, and U.S. Presidents. He was also a professor, authored numerous magazine articles, was a staff columnist for the New York Times, and wrote and published nine books on photography.

Rothstein, the son of Jewish immigrants, was born in Manhattan, New York City on July 17, 1915 to Isadore Rothstein and Nettie Perlstein Rothstein. He grew up in the Bronx and showed an early interest in photography.

Arthur Rothstein began photographing in college at Columbia University, where he founded the University Camera Club and was the photography editor of The Columbian, the undergraduate yearbook. While studying at Columbia University, he met economics instructor Roy Stryker. As a college senior in 1935, Rothstein prepared a set of copy photographs for a picture sourcebook on American agriculture that Roy Stryker and another professor, Rexford Tugwell, were assembling. Before the year was out, Stryker left Columbia to be part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal brain trust. Upon graduation, Roy Stryker hired Rothstein as the first photographer on the Farm Security Administration (FSA) staff in Washington, D.C.

One widely-recognized photograph is Rothstein’s 1936 image entitled Fleeing a Dust Storm. Taken in April of 1936 to document the Dust Bowl, this image shows farmer Arthur Coble and his two sons in Cimarron County, Oklahoma, during a dust storm. Rothstein took this photo to show people in the eastern United States what was happening to fellow Americans, their farms, and others living in the Great Plains. Those in the East “had no contact and no sense of identity with this poor farmer walking across the dusty soil on his farm in Oklahoma, which gave him a sense of identity.”

He also used his work to help establish soil conservation practices and convince Washington to send government aid to the Great Plains. His documentary photographs also helped promote photography as a respected art form.

In 1947, he married Grace Goodman, and the couple had four children. The same year, Rothstein rejoined Look as Director of Photography. He remained at Look until 1971 when the magazine ceased publication.

The following year, he joined Parade magazine, serving in various capacities until his death. During that period, he also taught photography and was a founding member of the American Society of Magazine Photographers, editing its in-house periodical for a year. Rothstein authored seven books about photojournalism that featured his images.