Profile of the Day: Ansel Adams

American photographer Ansel Adams was born on this day in 1902. Adams is perhaps best remembered for his stunning black and white images of the American West. He used his work to help promote the conservation of the American wilderness.

Image: Ansel Adams / Wikimedia Commons

Adams was born on February 20, 1902 in San Francisco, California to distinctly upper-class parents. Although his grandfather founded a prosperous lumber business, Adams would come to condemn the industry for cutting down many of the great redwood forests.

After his first trip to Yosemite National Park in 1916, Adams began experimenting with photography. He joined the Sierra Club and became the caretaker of the Sierra Club’s lodge in Yosemite throughout the 1920s. During this time, he took breath taking landscape photographs of the Yosemite Valley and the High Sierras. In 1927, he published his first portfolio, Parmelian Prints of the High Sierras.

Considered one of the most important landscape photographers in American history, Adams’s work and environmental advocacy helped expand the National Park system. In 1980, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in recognition of his efforts to preserve the country’s wild and scenic areas.

Adams died on April 22, 1984 at the age of 82.

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