The Great War Like You’ve Never Seen It (Photos)
Edward Steichen did much to advance the cause of photography in the early 20th century, including pioneering work in aerial photography in wartime, a slice of his career little known until now. As always, he was a master.

USASC via Cambridge University Press

In Camera Aloft: Edward Steichen in the Great War, Von Hardesty explains how Steichen, one of the 20th century’s most influential photographers, also had an outsized impact on the art of aerial photography. Although in his mid-thirties when World War I broke out, Steichen volutnteered with the U.S. expeditionary force and forged a photographic unit that set the standard for decades. Along with telling this heretofore overlooked story in Steichen’s life, Camera Aloft also presents a striking collection of little known images that have lost none of their innovative power in the course of a century.
Camera Aloft is published April 30 by Cambridge University Press. The images here are reprinted with the permission of the author and the publisher.
USASC via Cambridge University Press

German Rumpler Taube airplane in flight
USASC via Cambridge University Press

Air Observer Balloon Corps

Germans prepare for observation fllight
USASC via Cambridge University Press

Stockpile of cameras for front
USASC via Cambridge University Press

Nieuport in Flight
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Motorcycle couriers
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Fred Place and camera
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Souilly airfield
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Laboratory of the 5th Photo Section
USASC via Cambridge University Press

Phony artillery positon of enemy
USASC via Cambridge University Press

Air observer with handheld camera
USASC via Cambridge University Press
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