1960-1969

Bernard Kolenberg
Huynh Thanh My
Klaus Frings
Oliver Noonan Jr.


Bernard Kolenberg (1927-1965)
Bernard Kolenberg, a photographer for the Times-Union of Albany, N.Y., who volunteered for AP service in Vietnam, was killed Oct. 2, 1965, when the jet bomber he was in collided with another bomber over central Vietnam. He was 38 and the first journalist to be killed in combat in Vietnam. Kolenberg had covered the war in Vietnam for five weeks in 1964, producing a series of photographs for the Times-Union, where he had worked for 20 years. "He was Bernie to everyone," the Times-Union said in a tribute published the day Kolenberg was killed, "including the last three New York governors." Kolenberg was noted for his courage taking difficult photos and his tenderness photographing children.


Huynh Thanh My (1937-1965)
An encounter in a muddy rice field with Horst Faas during the Vietnam War led Huynh Thanh My to join AP in 1963. My was working as a freelancer for CBS covering a battle in the Mekong Delta when Faas, AP Saigon’s photo chief, offered him a job. My already was an established cameraman and actor in South Vietnam, and under Faas' training became one of AP's most capable photographers, renowned for his fearlessness. On Oct. 10, 1965, the 28-year-old was covering another Delta battle when he was wounded in the chest and arm. He was killed by the enemy while awaiting evacuation. After My’s death, Faas hired his teenage brother, Huynh Cong “Nick” Ut, who went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in 1973 for his picture of young Kim Phuc, screaming as she fled a napalm attack. “Everything I have accomplished, I owe to him. My brother taught me the value of skills, honor and determination,” Nick Ut said. “He taught me to control fear of gunfire and death which is so necessary for both soldiers and photographers. I miss him very much, and I hope I would have made him proud.”

Klaus Frings (1935-1968)
Photographer Klaus Frings died April 17, 1968, two days after being struck in the head by a rock while taking pictures of a clash between police and some 2,000 demonstrators outside the Munich printing plant of the Bild-Zeitung. He was 32. Frings kept shooting when the demonstration reached a heated stage, despite threats from the students, who said the pictures might be used against them. Holding his camera high overhead, Frings took what turned out to be his last picture. Within seconds, a fist-size rock fatally struck him in the head. Frings, a native of Muenster, Germany, had worked for the AP for four years, the last two as a staffer based in Munich.

Oliver Noonan Jr. (1939-1969)
Oliver Noonan was aboard an Army helicopter shot down southwest of Danang, Vietnam, on Aug. 19, 1969, killing him, an infantry battalion commander and six other soldiers. He was 29. That day, he’d carried a large metal camera case, joking to a reporter-colleague, “If they shot at the helicopter, I’ll hide behind it.” Noonan, the son of a Boston news photographer, had taken leave from the Boston Globe to cover the war. Joining AP in Saigon, he spent most of his time covering the troops. “Every step is earned here,” he wrote home. “Nothing is free.” Noonan’s byline also appeared on AP stories, including one on the departure of an Army combat unit that began America’s withdrawal from Vietnam.

 


 

Buy AP News | Buy AP Photos | Buy AP Video | Buy AP Audio | Buy AP Books | Careers | Shop AP Essentials