Paul Berg (photographer)

Paul Berg was an American photojournalist for the St. Louis, Missouri Post-Dispatch, and also wrote about the practice of photojournalism. Early career At the University of Chicago, Paul Berg in partnership with John G. Morris issued a student newspaper Pulse in September, 1937 which they published until March, 1941, when America became involved in WW2. Berg served in the Signal Corps at the Battle of the Bulge. Pulse was a bold attempt to launch the colleagues' careers in journalism, described by Morris as; "a radically different college publication, its news section modelled on Time, a monthly survey in the manner of Fortune, and photographs of the candid-camera type, like those in Life” They and their colleagues went into professional careers: Paul Berg became a staff photographer for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, John Corcoran for Science Illustrated, Myron Davis for Life, and David Eisendrath for the Chicago Times and New York's PM. During this time Berg married Beatrice ('Bea') Bunes Berg a freelancer who from the 1960s contributed arts criticism published in the St Louis Post-Dispatch, The Washington Post. and The New York Times Post-Dispatch photographer After the War, Berg worked for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch New York bureau from 1952-1972, when the newspaper closed the office and recalled him to St. Louis. Commentary on his newspaper work appeared frequently in Popular Photography magazine, used as an example of a creative approach to reportage and documentary work. One writer, in discussing his picture 'School's Out’, notes that Berg was “well-known for his photographic studies on sociological questions and problems, which frequently appear in the Sunday picture section of his paper.” The Dispatch Sunday supplement, known at different times over its nearly six decade run as PICTURES, Sunday PICTURES, Post-Dispatch Magazine, PD Magazine, and St. Louis Post-Dispatch Magazine changed from a full-size broadsheet to a tabloid format in November 1959. Julius H. Klyman, editor of the Sunday supplement used Berg's photography, as well as that of co-staffers Arthur Witman, Jack Gould, Sam Caldwell and David Gulick, to raise the profile of the magazine.