Thomas J. Kelly III (August 8, 1947), born in Hackensack, New Jersey, is an American, Pulitzer prize-winning photojournalist. Based in greater Philadelphia, he has worked as a freelancer for electronic and print outlets since 1990. Kelly joined the staff of The Mercury in Pottstown, Pennsylvania in 1974, where he won the 1979 Pulitzer prize for spot news photography; he left The Mercury in 1989.
Table of Contents
- 1 Career
- 1.1 MONSTERS: A Horror Microfiction Anthology (Dark Drabbles Book 3)
- 1.2 Melvin & Howard
- 1.3 The Last of the Finest
- 1.4 David Halberstam's the Fifties [VHS]
- 1.5 Sunny Days Entertainment Thomas & Friends Tent – Pop Up Play Tent for Kids - Big Thomas The Train Toys
- 1.6 Road House [VHS]
- 1.7 Shakedown (1988)
- 1.8 Star Wars The Black Series Imperial Stormtrooper Electronic Voice Changer Helmet, Collector Item, Ages 8 and up (Amazon Exclusive)
- 1.9 Columbia Pictures Film Noir Classics III
- 1.10 Thomas & Friends Bridge Lift Thomas & Skiff train set with motorized engine and toy boat for preschool kids ages 3 years and up
Career
Kelly worked in a variety of jobs, as a salesman, draftsman and as a volunteer firefighter. He began his career in journalism, in 1969, as a part-time staff enthusiast with the Norristown Montgomery Post, working subsequent to the processing until 1971. Kelly left the Post and began operational as a photographer for a Valley Forge newspaper, Today’s Post, in Pennsylvania, until desertion in 1974, to play with the Pottstown Mercury, as their Photography Supervisor. He sophisticated became the Chief Photographer, and next continued as a freelance photojournalist.
In the spring of 1978, Kelly caught a call coming more than the police scanner that the Goodwill Ambulance needed instruction in East Coventry County where “someone was stabbing everybody.” Kelly arrived at the scene of what would become an hour-long standoff, between the police and Richard Greist. Finally, police made the decision to storm the dwelling in an effort to save the family members. Kelly took fused rolls of film during the incident, including the instant that Chief Detective Douglas Weaver curt in to grab six year old-fashioned Beth Ann Greist, bloody from compound stab wounds, the young woman in one arm and his shotgun in the other hand; at one point, Greist broke pardon from the custody of the officers and charged Kelly, who would later tell he didn’t even do that he had taken a photo of the incident because it happened correspondingly suddenly.
Eleven of Kelly’s photographs were published by the Mercury the next-door morning and in 1979 he won the annual Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography, for those series of photographs. In the book, Press Photography Award 1942-1998, the jurors on the prize committee are quoted as saying, in choosing Kelly as the first place winner, that ‘”Kelly’s pictures vividly illustrate pictorial judgement below extreme pressure. The photographer’s intuitive suitability captured virtually all significant moment of a highly-dangerous, quick upsetting event…The pictures were taken at considerable personal risk and represent higher than merely instinctive at the right place at the right time.”‘
The series of photos, titled “Tragedy on Sanatoga Road,” were featured in a TNT documentary, “Moment of Impact: Stories of the Pulitzer Prize Photographs,” and have been included in combined exhibitions all but the country.
Kelly worked as the Director of Photography for The Trentonian in New Jersey in 1990, leaving in 1996 to pursue freelance photojournalism.
Last update 2021-08-06