Dirck Halstead was the youngest combat photographer ever hired by LIFE magazine, when at the age of 17, he covered the Guatemalan revolution. He spent 15 years as a photographer with United Press International in Dallas, Philadelphia, Washington, New York and Vietnam. In 1972 Dirck was one of six photographers chosen by the White House to accompany President Richard Nixon on his historic visit to China. From 1972 until 2000 he was a Time magazine contract photographer covering the White House and major events around the world. Dirck has won many awards for his photography, including the Robert Capa Gold Medal for his coverage of the fall of Saigon. He has been honored by the White House News Photographers Association for lifetime achievement, The Joseph A. Sprague Award from the National Press Photographer’s Association, it’s highest honor, two Eisie’s, the top award for magazine photography, and in early 2007 was awarded the University of Missouri’s Honor Medal for distinguished service to journalism. Halstead is a senior fellow at the Center For American History, The University of Texas in Austin.

Dirck Halstead’s lectures showcase his award-winning photographs combined with a fast-paced, often hilarious assessment of presidents and stars that take the audience behind the scenes and share true stories of what really transpires in a business where “the inmates are in charge of the asylum.”

INTO THE DIGITAL AGE
After 29 years as Time magazine’s Senior White House photographer, Halstead took his experience to the World Wide Web as publisher and editor of The Digital Journalist, an online monthly magazine for visual journalism, which is read by more than 1 million people a month.

He also foresaw how the Web was going to have a profound effect on photojournalism, and in 2000 created The Platypus Workshops which has trained hundreds of photographers in the language of television documentary. Halstead is an acute observer of trends in journalism, and offers informed commentary of the changes in media, and how it will affect journalism students, and how they should prepare themselves for success in this highly competitive area.