Tag Archives: emmett-till

That photo of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. riding one of the first desegregated buses in Montgomery, Ala.? He took it. The well-known image of black sanitation workers carrying “I Am A Man” signs in Memphis? His. He was the only photojournalist to document the entire trial in the murder of Emmett Till, and he was there in Room 306 of the Lorraine Hotel, King's room, on the night he was assassinated. But now an unsettling asterisk must be added to the legacy of Ernest C. Withers, one of the most celebrated photographers of the civil-rights era: He was a paid FBI informant. On Sunday, The Commercial Appeal newspaper in Memphis published the results of a two-year investigation that showed Withers, who died in 2007 at age 85, had collaborated closely with two FBI agents in the 1960s to keep tabs on the civil-rights movement. It was an astonishing revelation about a former police officer nicknamed the “Original Civil Rights Photographer,” famous in part for the trust he had engendered among high-ranking civil-rights leaders, including King. “It is an amazing betrayal,” said Athan Theoharis, a historian at Marquette University who has written books about the FBI. “It really speaks to the degree that the FBI was able to engage individuals within the civil-rights movement. This man was so well trusted.” From at least 1968 to 1970, Withers, who was black, provided photographs, biographical information and scheduling details to Howell Lowe and William H. Lawrence, two FBI agents in the bureau's Memphis domestic surveillance program, according to numerous reports summarizing their meetings. The reports were obtained by the newspaper under the Freedom of Information Act and posted on its website. Story continues http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2012889616_spyphotog14.html?sy… added by: Stoneyroad