Life and Lunch: Alfred Eisenstaedt’s Weyerhaeuser Timber Crew Photographs
In December 1954, Life magazine photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt journeyed into the woods near Snoqualmie Falls, Washington, for an unusual assignment. His subjects were a Weyerhaeuser Timber Company logging crew. But instead of photographing them felling trees, the men would appear in a Life magazine photo essay of Americans doing what millions did everyday—eating lunch.
Eisenstaedt was already a renowned photographer by this time. Best known for his "V-J Day in Times Square" photo, he served as a staff photographer from 1936 to 1972 for Life, a photojournalism magazine with a peak weekly circulation of more than 2 million. Over his career he shot 90 covers, and had more than 2,500 photo stories in the magazine. One of these was "The U.S. Goes Out to Lunch," which appeared in a special issue about food on January 3, 1955.
His essay appeared on page 67, under the subheading "The noonday break, more efficient than epicurean, revictuals a busy people." The sequence of photos captured a construction worker, mailman, soldier, business executives, and others (including Angela Lansbury in full costume during filming of the movie Court Jester), all while on their lunch breaks. One photo from his December 1954 series of Weyerhaeuser loggers appeared, showing faller and bucker Emil Kantola eating in front of a campfire.
While this was only one that appeared, Eisenstaedt took many other photos of the Weyerhaeuser crew that day. Seven other photos of the crew are in the FHS Archives. These black-and-white shots show Kantola and the rest of the group of unidentified loggers in hardhats eating, drinking, and smoking on a cold December afternoon. Through Eisenstaedt's unique eye, these photos provide a raw and authentic look at this everyday scene. View the unpublished shots of the Weyerhaeuser Timber crew taken by Eisenstaedt in the slideshow below.
