Weegee made the murders and violent crime of post-Prohibition New York City his thing. Warning: Photos of dead bodies.
"Weegee" was the pseudonym of this guy with the humble photo captions.
Weegee / International Center of Photography
His real name was Arthur Fellig, and he rose to prominence as a tabloid news photographer in the 1930s. The end of the Depression, the repeal of Prohibition, and a governmental crackdown on organised crime meant there was a huge surge in the rate of murders and violent crime in New York City.
He documented the victims of one of the largest and most prolonged crime wars in US history.
Hundreds of bodies, hundreds of stories.
To quote the guy himself: "Murder is my business."
Body of gambler/bookmaker/gangster Dominick Didato, New York, 6 August 1936. Killed in an efficient and expertly executed mob hit. No witnesses came forward, and the murder was never solved.
Weegee/International Center of Photography
Weegee got his nickname from back when he was on the lowest rung of the photography lab: the squeegee boy, whose job was to dry the prints before bringing them to the newsroom.
By 1945 he was signing his work "Photo by Weegee the Famous".
