Rip-Roaring Day at Ripple Rock

what color was the explosion a triple rock red blue yellow black combined to create an image and impression a spectacle in color this is the story of a magazine light set partly in and around this tall building on Rockefeller Plaza during Easter week April 1958 but this building is only the hub of a worldwide news gathering operation here in the building's brain Center the wire room messages flow steadily to and from the 600 editorial staff members of life this wire room is the sensitive link with life's 15 domestic bureaus 16 overseas offices and a worldwide core over 300 stringers who day and night feed in news fresh ideas story suggestions and long-range plans through these machines from the Seattle Bureau came first word of the world's largest non-atomic blasting job a triple rock in British Columbia life is pictures ideas visually expressed in tens of thousands of photographs pouring in day by day to be examined accepted or rejected printed or filed away a brimming flood of pictures unprecedented in volume unparalleled in scope the book comes from life's 36 photographers all over the world two of whom were assigned to the ripple rock storage ripple rock glides between Vancouver Island and the mainland in his office in New York reporter CEM Gould fog digs through a mass of background material Canadian Admiralty charts maps to help an artist to draw a diagram instructions to cover the explosion by air land and perhaps even underwater he typed the assignment over the teletype it goes out to Bob Sherman seattle bureau chief at Easter time the West Coast team lays plans while other life stories brew around the world Wednesday April 9th 10 a.m. in Belgium photographer Mike Rozier visits the World's Fair in Brussels with reporter Israel Schenker helping carry the gear the fate of all life reporters in the American pavilion they meet Saul Steinberg who's witty murals adorn the US exhibit the reporter is the photographer's shadow but he's far more with ear tuned to the quotable quote to capture the lively detail and record the shots one by one that same Wednesday near a home photographer ed Clark flashes his pass at the White House gate where he checks in to cover a presidential press conference the photographers are arranged across a platform at the back of the room after two terms of office and three illnesses mr. Eisenhower enters the conference room shown here in color for the first time the other half of the life team Charles Moore takes notes on a question he just asked each press conference makes news and our Washington bureau is always at hand photographs from the world of tomorrow this April scene is set in the desert of White Sands New Mexico J iron master technician shows us the loading of life cameras into the nose of the navy's aerobee rocket the flaming take on the earth falling away below to reveal a strange glimpse of our planet this photo montage from 100 miles up in the thin emptiness getting closer to earth a continuing source of pictures our aerial photographers like Tony Linc Tony's specialty is banking his own single-engine plane flying solo as he is here at a perilous angle look ma no hands while he shoots the sprawl of suburbia or the strange compelling architecture of a new church this one in Stamford Connecticut churches yield artistic triumphs and pose photographic problems as Dimitri castle knows but Dimitri has the expert touch this stunning methode alter screen shines forth in life's easter issue as clearly as though painted yesterday the Flemish masterpieces at the cloisters in New York pictures from all over some feature some news some planned some predictable but the parachute jump of a 101st Airborne Division at Fort Campbell Kentucky brought unexpected results disaster struck a tragic death of five paratroopers and the injury of 150 others by freak ground winds became headline news expanded into a five-page black and white lead in life with pictures from United Press photographer Vic Cooley in Nashville life stories are found all over the world many spectacular color essays come from faraway places with strange-sounding names this Easter Brits goro with an artist and reporter in tow set off for the ancient Mayan city Tikal lost beneath the jungles of Guatemala excavations will be staffed by the University of Pennsylvania Museum and will go on for years Goro's first views from the air were of a dense jungle through whose 130-foot canopy only the tallest temples protrude with a hint of fabulous palaces to be uncovered and will be shown in exclusive pictures and paintings to our readers later this year a project of major importance pictures from an even more colorful land the South Sea Island of ontong Java Eliott Ellis often roams were the men struttin gaily colored masks and plumage the women just dance and dance and dance elliott does a little dance too and no wonder Ellis often is equally at home on Broadway here today's stars posed for him in roles they've always dreamed of playing Judy Holliday in The Glass Menagerie Jason Robards jr. in idiot's delight and Peter Ustinov has King Lear people places faces wonder and tragedy life catches the world going by the ripple rock assignment has been received in Seattle a sunny Thursday April 3rd fine sea plane standing by defy equipment and photographers North to Vancouver Island and British Columbia there's the ripple at last beautiful from the air but a menace to navigation the ripples and Eddy is caused by twin peaks of rock only a few feet beneath the water in a century they've claimed a hundred and fourteen ships a hundred lives dupont of canada has taken on the massive job of removal Monte's warned local residents to open their windows against the shock waves and to leave home for the day launches have provided for transportation to and from the island these heavy bunkers overlook the site and will shelter crew and cameras Marshall Lachman one of life's two photographers photographs the mineshaft 600 feet below this point tunnels lead underwater into the rocks where two and three-quarter million pounds of high explosive lye ready out in a launch technical wizard Ernie stout is over the ripple with two skin diving photographers specially hired to try four pictures of the submerged menace hmm what's this a camera net Fartman poses them for a shot but the water proved too murky the currents too treacherous no farewell picture of the ugly rocks today by dusk on Good Friday all was in readiness the ripple rock assignment awaited only execution in contrast to a news stories such as ripple rock there are essays which take shape in the mind of a creative photographer such as Nina lien who we follow on her travels about the country thinking pondering jotting notes for her latest essay she took the theme of happiness that intangible personal to 'men emotion but let's eavesdrop on Nina's thoughts many people talk about happiness without really knowing what they mean in my story I want to show that happiness is made up of a lot of daily happy moments for instance warm camera glow around a birthday cake the feeling of being loved and needed driving around the country I was thinking about those ideas for my pictures at a studio in Connecticut I watched this artist making a beautiful statue may be immortal art how much satisfaction she gets from her work everywhere along the roadside ISO letterboxes letters can mean a lot to people those letter boxes became symbols to me those little things add up to happiness by Easter Nina's pictures were completed and the writer and layout man take over skillful hands block out the pictures text captions the parts become the whole a major photo essay is born and so we leave Nina leans dream world of happiness the seen ripple rock the time early morning on Saturday April the 5th slowly the gray smoke and cloud drift away into the rain in the turbulent water dead fish belly upwards barb on the curling crest of a tidal wave six hours later the Sun shines again the hazardous rocks only a memory with cameras unloaded the film takes off for New York carrying with it the message operation a complete success operation a complete success such might well have been Charles Darwin's words on his return from the Beagle voyage years later came the Origin of Species life is now commemorating these epic discoveries with five expeditions in Darwin's footsteps at 15,000 feet in the high Andes of Bolivia la laguna colorado and laguna verde Roger Tory Peterson the famous ornithologist is in pursuit of rare birds his first discovery a colony of 10,000 James flamingos which experts thought extinct this slog through miles of queasy mud the bed of an ancient lake is a grueling hike at so high an altitude the Indian guides descendants of the ancient Incas strongly opposed the trip for their main food is flamingo haze and war to anyone who disturbs the nests as well as three different kinds of flamingos Peterson found a bird never before photographed a horned coot its chick feeding busily by its side their nest is a huge heap of water weeds piled up from the lake bottom andean flamingos feeding and besting and flying the pale sky full of beating wings just as darwin saw them a century ago a second Darwinian expedition finds artist Rudi Freund and the ubiquitous Alfred Eisenstaedt exploring the Galapagos volcanic Peaks thrusting above the waters of the Pacific where relics of earlier eras abound tortoises a different kind on each Island penguins and iguanas eysie is entranced drives the tortoises from every angle including the jockeys back at his home in Connecticut Rudi Freund is now at work painting the discoveries still wearing the beard from his voyage in pursuit of iguanas to those remote islands slowly in intricate detail and scientific accuracy the illustrations come alive life uses artists whose very techniques vividly supplement the cameras eye the talents of life's artists are displayed in these books assembled from the pages of the magazine often bestsellers found in the home and in the classroom sometimes translated into foreign languages a new life book is on its way this summer a cookbook called from the modern living departments colorful stories on desserts and salads cocktails and cool concoctions at Leone's restaurant the fabulous array of bottles on the wall of the cellar backdrop a spread of Italian dishes to gladden the heart everyone talking with their hands perhaps mouths are too full to speak at then Rosa's studio another chapter on cocktail parties is being photographed then makes his final arrangements and here checks for authenticity behind the canapes of a feat of Mary Hammonds staff and their friends to suggest a merry party caught for a moment in a flash of strobe thousand pictures with a common destination at dawn Easter Sunday morning here come our ripple walk pictures through a familiar door by special courier from the airport in a record eight hours transparencies will be in the hands of the editors but first war film must be processed expert technicians must develop it spongy door roll by roll and dry it on a whirligig date that Sunday afternoon the transparencies will be in the hands of piggy sergeant whose quick infallible eye is legend spread on a light table they have weighed and balanced expertly scan for color detail focus quality composition eventually comes the word they're good from managing editor Ed Thompson his problem now to juggle quick cursing advertisements find Story room in the mock up and around him team work against the clock turning that prosaic word editing into a speedy weekly panorama by 11:00 p.m. on Easter Sunday final pasting up the choice of a title and our pictures are off once again by the midnight flight to Chicago and the presses through its editorial page life each week speaks its mind this Easter its opinions were making headlines letters have swapped the letters Department in an unprecedented way since this editorial appeared about education followed two weeks later by this one Frank Gibney who wrote the editorials and Jack Jessup chief editorial writer read over some of these misses many Pro and many con but non neutral a veritable storm of opinion for and against a five part series on education appeared in the magazine at the same time as the editorials this lead picture was caught by Yale Joel who attached a wire to the homemade ramjet rocket to trip the strobe lights as it hurtled by his battery of cameras and the startled faces of these science students another photographer who has evolved a unique system of remote but controlled picture taking his life's sports expert George silk but George will tell you about it himself my lord some thousand one ski and mounted a tripod head on the tip I used a pen on camera which has an extremely wide angle lens and put the release tube along the groove under the ski then up my leg under my ski pants and sweater the squeeze bulb I tucked inside my mitten I practiced with a ski patrolman for a while the rig weighs four pounds you know and I had to train a bit to ski with this extra load on one toe and finally an expert down a steep trail isn't all beer and skittles even without a camera usually I don't go for ski stories but this story I really like doing you see I wanted to take the reader down mountain right along with me let him feel that big jump and the rush of some fast action and that swooping sensation a lot of people wonder why skiers love the silly sport but I've skied ever since I was a kid in New Zealand and it's still one of my favorite sports and the fellows that have seen a winter sunset like this one will understand why by early Monday morning our ripple Rock pictures have arrived in Chicago from New York on their way to the production line step by Swift step they come nearer to printing through the elaborate processes of photo engraving and touching proofing they move towards the presses at Aradhana Lee's massive plant life is printed here life has its own color room where ripple rock was examined proofed and corrected once more Dan Sibley marks a subsequent story politics in Alabama in this room soon the presses are rolling in a matter of hours since the blast ripple rock is on its way to the reader as the presses roll around the world around the clock wherever news is made life and its photographers are on hand this Easter however found seven photographers in New York so we asked them over to our studio to meet you and gave them an assignment Lisa Larson just back from Hungary Bob Kelly Stan Wayman Ralph Morse Yale job Joe sure shell and Walter Sanders and a fantastic collection of cameras to boot Hasselblad Micah contacts Minox panin linha and the assignment we gave them why to follow our story through it's another kind of ripple rock the fabulous Egyptian dancing twins the Jamal sisters that's life too brother I wonder if they'll make the cover what color was the explosion a triple rock well as we suggested before the answer is fourfold our blast is blue red yellow and black all combined to bring you this impression of high explosive from these four basic inks come the kaleidoscope of color week by week year by year off these presses comes like the end result of the emotions and craft and creative skill that go into the planning executing and editing of this picture magazine a magazine whose ideals are so well expressed in these words of justice Oliver Wendell Holmes