When it comes to the excellence of their collections, the beauty of their galleries and the sheer breadth of their cultural significance, few museums on earth can match Paris’ monumental jewel, the Louvre. In 1953, when LIFE photographer Dmitri Kessel visited, many of the Louvre’s rooms had recently been reorganized and redecorated but the intrinsic, inherent grandeur of the vast place (eight miles of galleries) remained undiminished.
Here, LIFE.com presents a selection of Kessel’s pictures of the scenes inside what LIFE unhesitatingly called “the world’s top museum”—a title to which, even today, six decades later, the wonderful, storied, glorious Louvre can arguably still lay claim.
Aerial view of the Louvre and the Tuileries Garden, 1953.
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, the Louvre, 1953.
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Patrons view Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, the Louvre, 1953.
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
The Raft of the Medusa, the Louvre
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Children take notes during a discussion of ancient Greek pottery at the Louvre, 1953.
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Venus de Milo, the Louvre, 1953.
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Married couple and their young daughter view the crown of King Louis XV at the Louvre, 1953.
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
The Louvre, 1953.
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Original caption: “Loading statue, worker places Roman carving of athlete on carriage to be taken to workshop where legs, put on by an earlier restorer, will be removed.”
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Artists scrutinize their versions of a Titian portrait (left) and the Mona Lisa (right), Louvre, 1953.
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
The Louvre, 1953.
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dusting a sculpture at the Louvre
Dmitri Kessel Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Painting of Jeanne d’Aragon by Raphael at the Louvre.
In 1971, Charles Manson and several of his followers—Tex Watson, Susan Atkins, Patricia Krenwinkel and Leslie Louise Van Houten—were convicted in the era-defining Tate-LaBianca murders that horrified not only Los Angeles, where the murders took place in the summer of 1969, but the entire nation. (Manson was convicted, in essence, as a “conspirator,” as he was not present at the killings, but ordered them to be carried out.)
The ferocity of the murders; the seeming randomness of the violence; and the chilling, bottomless weirdness of the Manson cult itself incised a terrible, indelible black mark on the late 1960s.
But it was during grand jury testimony and at the trial of Manson and his followers with the trial itself serving as a kind of bleak circus that lasted nine months, from the summer of 1970 to the spring of 1971 that the nation was able to gauge just how deeply unhinged “the Family” truly was.
Carving x’s in their foreheads? No problem. Shaving their heads to show solidarity with their leader? Done. Blocking entrances to the courthouse, chanting, singing, treating the trial and, by extension, the murders themselves like a trip to the amusement park? For the Manson clan, it was all grist for their cheery, death-adoring psychopathy.
After all, if Manson, Krenwinkel and the rest were going to be tried and (quite obviously) convicted of mass murder by the “establishment” and “the pigs” they despised, the least their brothers and sisters in the Family could do was show the world that, in the universe they inhabited, the killers were not truly criminals at all, but instead were iconoclasts. Rebels. Heroes.
Here, LIFE.com presents pictures from late 1969, when Manson and his co-defendants were finally indicted and charged in the Tate-LaBianca murders.
All these years later, the sight of Manson and his dead-eyed acolytes is still ghastly. But as long as pictures like these bear witness, the people whose lives were taken—Sharon Tate; Jay Sebring; Wojciech Frykowski; Abigail Folger; Steven Parent; Leno and Rosemary LaBianca—will remain in sight, and those who slaughtered them will be remembered not (as some would have it) as wayward, misled children, but as men and women who entered the homes of strangers and in a spasm of savagery ended life after life after life.
Liz Ronk edited this gallery for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter at @LizabethRonk.
Charles Manson was led to court for a grand jury appearance in California in 1969.
Vernon Merritt III The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Charles Manson in custody, 1969.
Vernon Merritt III The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Charles Manson in custody, 1969.
Vernon Merritt III The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
A Charles Manson supporter outside the courthouse during his murder trial, Los Angeles, 1970.
Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Charles Manson supporters outside the courthouse during his murder trial, Los Angeles, 1970.
Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
A Charles Manson supporter outside the courthouse during his murder trial, Los Angeles, 1970.
Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Deputy district attorney Vincent Bugliosi in the Los Angeles Hall of Justice was interviewed at the beginning of grand jury hearings in the Tate-LaBianca murders, 1969.
Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Manson Family member Susan Atkins left the Grand Jury room, Los Angeles Hall of Justice, December 1969.
Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Manson Family member Susan Atkins, 21, emerged from a Los Angeles courtroom after grand jury testimony, December 1969.
Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Charles Manson, 1969
Vernon Merritt III The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Manson family members Lynn “Squeaky” Fromme, 21, and Sandra Pugh, 26. Pugh brought her two-and-a-half month-old baby, Ivan, to court. They said they knew nothing of the Tate murders. “Manson was magnetic,” Pugh said. “His motions were like magic.”
Vernon Merritt III The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Manson Family members Lynn “Squeaky” Fromme and Sandra Pugh, 1969.
Vernon Merritt III The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Charles Manson and his attorney, 1969.
Vernon Merritt III The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Look at the titles and roles for which Dustin Hoffman is best known, and you’ll see clear proof that the Los Angeles native is one of the most accomplished screen actors America has ever produced: The Graduate. Midnight Cowboy. Little Big Man. Kramer vs. Kramer. Rain Man. Papillon. Tootise. Lenny. All the President’s Men. Wag the Dog.
And then, of course there’s his television work including his role voicing Lisa’s cool, sensitive, thoughtful substitute teacher, Mr. Bergstrom, in one of the greatest episodes of The Simpsons.
Here, LIFE.com offers photographs of Dustin Hoffman—most of which never ran in LIFE—made by John Dominis when the actor was just coming into his own as an artist and a star. (Many of the photos here feature Hoffman with his first wife, Anne Byrne, and her daughter from a previous marriage, Karina.)
At the time these pictures were made, Midnight Cowboy and The Graduate were behind him. Many of his greatest, defining roles were still ahead of him. But Hoffman admitted something to the magazine in the July 11, 1969, issue of LIFE in which a few of these pictures first appeared that today sounds a bit jarring:
“I don’t think at 50 you should be doing what you did when you were 30,” he said, referring to his own plans to become a director as soon as possible. “Acting, especially film acting, seems to me to be more of a female profession. The director, who has all the creative power, really uses the actor. I don’t know many actors who enjoy the work of acting. I like the adulation, the money, the whole gimmick of it, but I don’t think I’m a natural actor.”
Then, in a kind of wistful coda, the 31-year-old Hoffman admits, “I don’t see how people who have done 70 movies keep going.”
Before he’s through, the man who has inhabited some of the most distinctive characters in film history might look back at that sort of declaration and crack that famous, crooked, knowing smile.
Liz Ronk edited this gallery for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter at @LizabethRonk.
Dustin Hoffman, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman with his stepdaughter Karina, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman with his stepdaughter Karina, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman with his stepdaughter Karina, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman signs autographs outside the theater where he starred in the play (which he also directed), Jimmy Shine, New York City, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman in his dressing room for the play (which he also directed), Jimmy Shine, New York City, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman in his trailer during the filming of the movie, John and Mary, in which he starred with Mia Farrow, New York City, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman with his wife Anne and daughter Karina, New York, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman and family, New York, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman and family, New York, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman naps between takes on the set, 1969
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman and wife, Anne, and their dog Ratso, New York, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman with his dog Ratso, New York, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman on the way to the theater with his dog, Ratso, New York, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman and Mia Farrow on set of the film, John and Mary, New York, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman plays tennis during filming of the movie, John and Mary, New York, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman asleep on the set of the 1969 movie, John and Mary.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman chases after his dog Ratso in New York’s Riverside Park, 1969.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Dustin Hoffman during filming of the 1969 movie, John and Mary.
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Original caption: “On a rare day away from work, Dustin Hoffman browsed in Greenwich Village shops with Anne and later kissed her in a taxi (above), New York, 1969.”
John Dominis The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Few movies are as polarizing as Stanley Kubrick’s sui generis 1968 sci-fi opus, 2001: A Space Odyssey. A good number of film critics and movie buffs argue that it’s an indispensable cinematic masterwork. Others admire its technical brilliance and the uncompromising strength of Kubrick’s vision, but find the movie’s impenetrable philosophy—whatever it might be—forbidding, or off-putting, or both. And then there are those (few, and not terribly convincing) naysayers who deride 2001 as little more than self-absorbed, emotionally sterile twaddle not far removed from an elaborate, unfunny hoax.
But even the film’s most strident critics acknowledge that there’s something about Kubrick’s strange, insular onscreen universe that commands our attention.
Here, LIFE.com offers a series of photos from the set of 2001 pictures that suggest the astonishing lengths to which Kubrick was willing to go in order to make his vision a reality. That the futuristic technology he envisioned feels authentic today speaks volumes about the man’s intellect, his dedication to the details of his craft and the boundless capacity for the human imagination to not only see, but to shape what’s to come.
Liz Ronk edited this gallery for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter at @LizabethRonk.
Stanley Kubrick on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Actors Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood listened to Stanley Kubrick on set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Stanley Kubrick on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Gary Lockwood and Keir Dullea on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Gary Lockwood and Keir Dullea on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Keir Dullea on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Stanley Kubrick on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Keir Dullea on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Gary Lockwood on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Keir Dullea on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Stanley Kubrick on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Keir Dullea on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Director Stanley Kubrick lined up a shot through a camera on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Gary Lockwood on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Stanley Kubrick on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey with a Polaroid camera.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Stanley Kubrick on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Stanley Kubrick on the set of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Dmitri Kessel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Decades ago, during the long, hot summer of 1967, the city of Detroit erupted in one of the deadliest and costliest riots in the history of the United States. Reportedly sparked by a police raid on an unlicensed bar on July 23, the conflagration lasted four terrifying days and nights, left scores dead and hundreds injured, thousands arrested, untold numbers of businesses looted, hundreds of buildings utterly destroyed and Detroit’s reputation in tatters.
The reasons behind the riot, of course, are far thornier—socially, economically, racially —han a mere raid on a gin joint. While Detroit in the mid-Sixties had a larger black middle class than most American cities its size—thanks in large part to strong unions, high employment and the thriving, all-powerful auto industry—it was hardly a model of racial harmony. (During World War II, for example, Detroit was the scene of an infamous race riot caused in large part by tensions between whites and blacks over jobs in auto plants that were churning out tanks, planes and other war-related goods.)
But the 1967 eruption, also known as the 12th Street riot, was remarkable not only for how long it lasted, but for the force that the city, state and federal authorities brought to bear in an effort to impose order on a city in flames. Then-governor George Romney sent in thousands of National Guard troops, while President Lyndon Johnson eventually ordered paratroopers from the 82nd Airborne on to the streets.
Long before even a semblance of calm was restored, however, chaos reined, and horrific tales of assaults, beatings, robberies and killings poured out of the city including allegations, later reported on by the great journalist John Hersey, that Detroit police officers murdered three young black men at a Detroit motel in the midst of the riots.
Throughout it all, photographer Lee Balterman (who died in March 2012 at the age of 91) was there, recording the terrible scene. Here, LIFE.com presents a selection of his most powerful pictures, most of which were never published in LIFE, chronicling one of the bleakest chapters in American history four days that stunned a nation and left scars on a great city that are still seen and felt today.
Determined to protect their property, both African-American and white store owners brought out weapons and stood ready to use them.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Detroit, July 1967.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Detroit, July 1967.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Detroit, July 1967.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Detroit, July 1967.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Detroit, July 1967.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Police evacuated an apartment building in search of sniper suspects during the riots.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Detroit, July 1967.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
A family took a walk in a neighborhood devastated by rioting.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
The aftermath of the riots, Detroit, 1967.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
The aftermath of the riots, Detroit, 1967.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
A Detroit police officer stood guard over a grocery store looted during race riots.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Detroit, July 1967.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
This family moved after the Detroit race riots.
Lee Balterman/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
A statue of Jesus Christ was smeared with brown paint during the riots.
There’s a storied tradition in show business that involves two seemingly incompatible but ultimately inextricable buddies. It’s almost always two men, who turn out to be far more entertaining when they’re together than when they’re apart. Laurel and Hardy, Abbot and Costello, Hope and Crosby, Penn and Teller, Gibson and Glover (for those who enjoy Gibson’s stock, “unpredictable crazy guy” characterizations) and on and on. At the risk of oversimplifying the ineffable chemistry that makes stars of some folks and also-rans of so many others, the dynamic driving these unlikely partnerships can be roughly represented as “straight man and clown,” with laughs arising, in large part, from the obvious friction between the near-lunacy (or idiocy) of the latter and the long-suffering patience of the former.
But no mismatched duo in showbiz history so reliably or profitably convulsed eager-to-roar audiences as Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis in the middle part of the 20th century. For ten years (in fact, for almost exactly ten years, from July 25, 1946, to late July 1956), Martin and Lewis performed their manic magic on nightclub stages, the radio, television and the silver screen.
Here, LIFE.com offers a series of photos by Ralph Morse, most of which never ran in LIFE magazine, of the berserk superstars at their most frantic, during a series of shows at New York’s Copacabana club in 1949.
With Martin playing his suave but jokey singer role to perfection and Lewis acting like a cross between a vaudevillian chimpanzee and a sugar-addled 8-year-old, the pair positively owned the entertainment world for the better part of a decade. In the early 1950s, especially, the two were nothing less than the most popular showbiz act in America, selling out theaters and legendary nightclubs, making hit movies and guest-starring on countless TV variety shows. They worked nonstop, with an act that drew much of its energy and its appeal from the fact that the two were very, very close friends. (They would famously fall out after the act broke up in 1956, and even more famously reconcile in later years, before Martin died in the mid-1990s.)
As LIFE told its readers in an August 1951 issue:
During a personal appearance tour to promote their newest movie, That’s My Boy, the young comedy team of Martin and Lewis made history inside and outside theaters in new York, Detroit and Chicago. The tour began at New York’s paramount Theater, where the comedians were guaranteed $50,000 a week plus 50% of the the theater’s profit over $100,000. This meant that rapid audience turnover was the key to a big take, but after their first show few patrons budged from their seats. Lewis finally got the happy fans out of the theater by advising them that the next performance (free) would be presented from the dressing-room window.
From that time on the comedians put on short alfresco acts after each stage show, and the ruse worked so well jamming traffic but emptying and refilling the house that they repeated it, sometimes in windows, sometimes on fire escapes, everywhere they went. Indoors or out, the kind of bedlam that distinguished their tour was wilder than anything provoked by Bob Hope at his zaniest or Frank Sinatra at his swooniest. Clowning outrageously, throwing themselves and their clothes about with maniacal energy, they broke up their audiences, broke all attendance records and nearly broke themselves down.
After four weeks Martin and Lewis had earned $260,000 in the theaters, establishing them as the highest paid act in show business… The comedians, who have been together five frantic years, already are planning more movies, more TV shows and more nightclub appearances. Asked why they bother when their income (the 1951 gross should reach $1.5 million) will go mostly for taxes), Lewis replies, “The government needs tanks.”
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, New York, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Original caption: “At Copa, Martin (under hat) and Lewis (falling at right) barge in on quartet and end on the floor in late show called ‘3 A.M. Mayhem.'”
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse/Life Pictures/Shutterstock
Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis at the Copacabana, 1949.
Ralph Morse Time & Life Pictures/Shutterstock
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