Charles C. Ebbets and His Famous 'Lunchtime Atop a Skyscraper' Photo
Below is one of the most iconic images of all time, “Lunchtime atop a Skyscraper.” It was taken by Charles C. Ebbets in 1932 – although he wasn’t officially recognised as the photographer until 2003. For over 70 years, the iconic image taken during the construction of the Rockefeller Center in New York, along with many of his other skyscraper photographs, had been mis-credited by the Bettman archives as “photographer unknown”.
The photo initially appeared in the New York Herald Tribune shortly after it was taken, but it didn’t achieve its iconic status until much later. Back then, photographers weren’t considered artists, they were just the operators of a machine. They billed their employer for the work and moved on. More often than not, the images they took were filed away, uncredited in the archives.
So why did it take so long for him to be credited for it? It has been claimed that multiple photographers collaborated on the shoot, which is likely true because, we do see several photographs of Charles himself taken that day by at least one other photographer. However, ever since “Lunch atop Skyscraper” was ‘rediscovered’ in the last two decades and began to circulate worldwide, no other photographer nor any photographer’s estate has ever claimed authorship of it.
