In 1945, 40-year-old Todd Webb was discharged from the Navy and decided to move to New York City. Before his time in the navy, Webb had gone through a litany of professions, and he eventually settled on photography after taking a class with Ansel Adams and meeting with Alfred Stieglitz.
Now, with Stieglitz’s encouragement, Webb decided to focus all of his energy on photographing the booming postwar city. He spent his nights sleeping in the kitchen of photographer Harry Callahan’s Harlem apartment, and his days riding the Third Avenue El from 125th Street down to the towers of Midtown, the ethnic enclaves of the Lower East Side, and the historic buildings of the Financial District, capturing signage, architecture, and street life using his large format camera.
When he wasn’t taking photos, he was befriending and learning from some of the photographers and artists in the city, such as Berenice Abbot, Georgia O’Keeffe, Lisette Model, and Gordon Parks. In 1946, after a year of photography, the Museum of the City of New York Gave Webb his first exhibition: I See a City.
Below are some of the wonderful photographs that he took during his time in New York.
Source: mashable
