Miller, Dan, 1943 August 24-

Dan Miller's career as a New York union photographer has spanned more than four decades, and is distinguished, among other things, as being the longest career of any photographer in New York labor history. Since 1959, Dan Miller has photographed the activities of numerous labor unions. Every year since 1962, Miller has photographed the annual Labor Day parade in New York City. Dan Miller's company, Miller Photography, which he shares with his son Jack Miller, continues to photograph numerous New York City labor union events and is the sole photographer for the United Federation of Teachers.

Dan Miller was born on February 2, 1922, in the Bronx, New York City. He became interested in photography at age nine, obtaining his first camera (one that developed its photographs by exposing its film to the sun) from coupons in a cereal box. Later, he began using a box camera, which he took with him wherever he went, shooting photographs for himself. Almost entirely self-taught (his only formal instruction was a two-week photography course at the New York Institute of Photography that he took as a teenager), he began his career as a freelance photographer while still in high school, working for the Parkchester Press, a Bronx newspaper. After graduating from high school he also did freelance work for The Villager, another New York City newspaper. In 1940, he took a full-time civilian job photographing weapons parts at the United States Army's Raritan Arsenal, in New Jersey. He joined the Army during World War II, enlisting in September 1942, and was almost immediately assigned to the Signal Corps in the China-Burma-India theater, where he served for three years, attaining the rank of technical sergeant. In the Signal Corps he worked in a special unit, consisting of only 35 men (most were from Hollywood, California, where they worked in motion picture studios). Headquartered in New Delhi, but traveling throughout the area, the unit's work was intelligence-related; it worked closely with the CIA's forerunner agency, the Office of Strategic Services (OSS), photographing captured documents and performing aerial photography of bomb targets. One of the unit's members was Lieutenant Arthur Rubenstein, in his civilian life head photographer for Look magazine, one of the premiere American illustrated publications. After the war, Rubenstein offered Miller a job at Look . Miller worked for Look as a laboratory technician and occasional photographer from 1951 until 1959, when he bought a house and built a darkroom and began his own freelance photography business, Dan Miller Photographer (now Miller Photographers). Miller's first client was Local 342 of the Amalgamated Meatcutters Union. Through word of mouth his business grew to include a long list of other labor unions-both national and local unions--and labor organizations, such as the New York City Central Labor Council. Labor photographer Sam Reiss was Miller's colleague and main competition.

Miller also shot for advertising agencies, liquor companies, and hospitals, and photographed social activists and politicians, including Dr. Martin Luther King, jr.,President John F. Kennedy, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, and New York Governor Nelson Rockefeller.

Not only was Miller a photographer of labor union activities, he was--almost certainly unique among freelance photographers for labor unions---a union member himself, first joining Local 966 of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, and later the Newspaper Guild.

Trade unionism and photography have held an important place not only in Miller's own life, but also in the life of his family. His daughter, Madeline, worked as a picture editor and photographer for People magazine for 26 years before retiring, and his two sons, Jack and Steve, joined Dan Miller as Miller Photography photographers. Jack Miller left Miller Photography to work for the Hotel and Restaurant Employees International Union. Steve Miller continues his career as a photographer, alongside his father. Their major clients are New York City-based trade unions, liquor companies, and hospitals.

From the guide to the Dan Miller Photographs, Bulk, 1964-1980, 1964-1997, (Bulk 1964-1980), (Tamiment Library / Wagner Archives)