Who owns this photograph?
The Columbia Journalism Review carried an exchange of letters between freelance photographer George Zimbel and the New York Times. The paper paid the photographer for a single use of a picture of John and Jacqueline Kennedy. Forty years later the paper offered the print for sale to collectors for US $4,000. Give it back, it’s mine, said the photographer.
![John and Jacqueline Kennedy in New York City, 1960 [George Zimbel photo from the cjr.org website]](images/zimbel.jpg)
In a letter to the paper Zimbel points out the important distinction between freelance photographers (who sold one-use rights but retained their intellectual property) and staff photographers (paid a salary by the paper which owned the rights to their work).
It’s clear from the correspondence that Zimbel was upset by this business — which is no surprise to me. He wrote to the newspaper’s lawyer:
You get paid when you write letters and I don’t, but sometimes I have to come out of the darkroom and tend to business and ethical issues.
Did the story have a happy ending? Well, the Times did send the print back to Zimbel.
I have photos of family members that were made before 1945 at different carnivals they visited. I wanted to have a couple of copies made for the rest of my family. The store I took them too said that because they look like they may have been professionly done, that they will not make copies of them without permission. They do not have a date or any information as to who made the different photographs. What do I need to do in order to have copies made? Without a possible lawsuit that is.