"Addison-Scurlock" (June 19,1883-December 16,1964)

Born in Fayetteville,North Carolina he graduated from there,and in 1900,moved with his family to Washington,D.C. His father George Clay Scurlock,had run unsuccessfully for the North Carolina

Senate.He also worked as a messager for the U.S. Treasury Department,While studying law and he later opened a law office on the 1100 block of U street.Addison began his career as a photographer as an apprentice to Moses P.Rice who studios on Pennsylvania Avenue.By 1904,he learned the basics of photographic portraiture and the entire range of laboratory work.That same year,he started his own business at his parents' home on Florida Avenue.Addison photographed students at Howard University,M Street,Armstrong High Schools,African-Americans universities,and high schools throughout the South.In 1907,he won a gold medal for photography at the Jamestown Exposition.He opened the Scurlock Studio in the African-American community's theatre district in 1911,and concentrated on portraiture and general photography.His clients included brides,successful peoples,politicians and presidents,convention guests,and socialites.A 1976 Washington Post article by Jacqueline Trescott read,"For years one on the marks of arriving socially in black Washington was to have your portrait in Scurlock's window."In addition to studio portraits,he mastered the use of the panoramic camera and shot conventions,banquets,and graduations.By the 1920s,Addison had earned national reputation.He was the official photographer of Howard University until his death in 1964,and he recorded all aspects of

university life.Addison also produced a series of portraits of African-American leaders that historian Carter G.Woodson disturbed to African-American schools nationwide.One of his most significant photographs was that of Marion Anderson singing in front of the Lincoln Memorial in 1939.A famous story told about him is that while shooting Kevin Coolidge with the Dunbar Cadet on the White House Lawn,he walked up to the president and moved him to another position for the sake of a better picture,much to the dismay of the Secret Service.Addison and his wife,Mamie Estelle,lived just a few blocks from the studio with their four sons Addison Jr.,Robert,George,and Walter.Mamie served as the studio's business manager.From 1948 until 1952,Robert,and George managed Capital School of Photography.Among their students were future Washington Post photogrphers and a young Jacqueline Bouvier who became the of John F.Kennedy.As founder of the Scurlock Photographic Studio, he took portraits of such notables as educators Booker T.Washington and Mary McLeod Bethune,composer Samuel Coleridge Taylor-Taylor,engineer Archie Alexander,political leader W.E.B. Du Bois,former first lady Mamie Eisenhower,singer Billy Eckstine,Dr.Charles Richard Drew,opera singer Madame Lillian Evanti,and poet Sterling Brown while documenting key moments in Washington,D.C. history.In 1964,Robert brought the Scurlock studio from his father from his father and purchased a studio on Connecticut Avenue.The Connecticut Avenue studio closed in the early 1970s and the 9th Street studio was demolished in 1983 for the Metro system.