Profile of the Day: Ansel Adams

On this day in 1902, photographer and environmentalist Ansel Adams was born in San Francisco, California. He is best remembered for his iconic black and white photos of the American wilderness, especially those of Yosemite National Park.

Image: Ansel Adams / U.S. National Archives and Records Administration

Adams was the only child born to Charles Hitchcock Adams and Olive Bray. His grandfather founded a prosperous lumber business, which his father eventually inherited. Adams would later come to condemn the lumber industry for cutting down many of the country’s great redwood forests.

Following a trip to Yosemite National Park in 1916, Adams began experimenting with photography. He started working with the Sierra Club and formed a passion for the Yosemite Valley and the High Sierras. He made his first professional breakthrough in 1927 with the publication of his first portfolio, Parmelian Prints of the High Sierras.

Considered one of the most important landscape photographers of the 20th century, Adams used his work to help promote the conservation of the American wilderness. In 1980, Adams was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Jimmy Carter in recognition of his work as a photographer and environmentalist.

Explore Ansel Adams’s family tree on Geni and share how you’re related to the photographer!

View Ansel Adams’s Geni Profile