Kravitt, Samuel, 1913-2000

Samuel Kravitt, was born in New Haven, Connecticut, in 1913. He left high school in 1929, intending to become a pilot. After borrowing a World War I aerial camera, however, he decided on a career in photography. From 1930 to 1931, he served as apprentice to Joseph Stone, a local portrait photographer. In 1932, Kravitt opened his first studio at age 19 in downtown New Haven. In the early 1930s, he was commissioned to document the lifestyle of the Shaker community in Hancock, Massachusetts. He subsequently relocated to New York and was staff photographer for the New York World's Fair Corporation from 1937 to 1939, documenting the construction of the Fair. Kravitt returned to New Haven in 1940, opening a studio in the Yale Record Building. He made a transition from still photography to filmmaking during the 1950s and in 1962 founded Associated Film Consultants, a New York-based independent production company. Kravitt died in 2000.