Students Come Face to Face with Iconic Photographs from the 1960s

Although the museum is closed to the public on Mondays, Rivers students were invited for a private tour of the exhibit followed by a question and answer session with Davis, who spent more then 12 years collecting the photographs. Students were guided through the exhibit by their United States History teachers.

“Kennedy to Kent State: Images of a Generation” features iconic images of a new cultural age in the United States, shot by some of the most prominent photojournalists of the era. The exhibition includes photos of the life, presidency, and assassination of John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy, Vietnam War and antiwar protests, the civil rights movement, the American Space Program and its mission to the moon, the Kent State shootings, influential pop culture icons like Bob Dylan, Twiggy, and The Beatles, and more.

Grade 11 Dean and Upper School History Teacher Will Mills said coming face to face with some of the most poignant scenes from the 1960s will pay enormous dividends when it comes to the students’ understanding of the political, economic, and social complexities of the time period in their studies this spring.

“Studying the same images in a book or online in the classroom just wouldn’t have had the same emotional or intellectual impact,” said Mills. “The exhibit truly helped to etch the decade into the minds of these students."

The entire collection now permanently resides at the Worcester Art Museum and is on view through February 3.