America’s First Female Photojournalist, Jessie Tarbox Beals, With Her Cameras

Here’s a photograph of Jessie Tarbox Beals, America’s first female photojournalist, with her camera on a street a century ago. While most female photographers of her time shot photos from the peace and safety of photo studios, Beals ventured into the world of photojournalism and made a name for herself through her tenacity, self-promotion, and freelance news photos.

The portrait above is a slightly cropped version of this photo from the collections of the Schlesinger Library at the Radcliffe Institute:

Here are some more historical photographs showing Beals with her various cameras:

Here are some of the photographs captured by Beals over the course of her career:

The Library and Congress has a great biographical essay you can read if you’d like to learn more about Beals’ life and work.