Friday’s entry in NPR’s series on color photography reminded me of cool story I was a part of. In 1985 I was hired to assist Joel Meyerowitz on a Sunday afternoon as he scouted locations for an ad shoot. When I picked him up at his hotel he told me he really just wanted to go to the Amon Carter Museum in Ft. Worth to see Avedon’s recently debuted “In the American West” exhibition.

While walking through the exhibit I looked on as a young man was setting up to take a picture of his young daughter in front of one the photographs. Almost immediately a security guard appeared, telling the young man photography was not allowed. I recognized the man as John Harrison, the subject of the photograph along with his daughter, an infant when Avedon had made the image and now appearing to be about 6.

John Harrison, lumber salesman, and his daughter Melissa, Lewisvile Texas, 11/22/81 by Richard Avedon

I quickly grabbed Joel’s attention, who asked if he might take the man’s picture, explaining he was friends with Dick Avedon and he would send Mr. Harrison the picture as well as give one to Avedon. The guard agreed as long as there was no flash, which Joel’s Leica was easily capable of doing.

So I looked on as Joel made a dozen or so exposures of Mr Harrison and his daughter smiling in front of the large mounted Avedon print.

Mr Harrison was genuinely grateful and seemed only to want a picture of his daughter and himself, no doubt unable to afford one of Avedon’s prints and seemingly oblivious to the fact that the two photographers he had been photographed by were Richard Avedon and Joel Meyerowitz.