Page 78 – LIFE

This Adorable Panda Was at the Center of a Cold War Conflict

December 28, 2020March 15, 2017 by

If anything could bring the gap between nations and ideologies, even at a time of tension and war, it just might be an adorable baby panda. But, even for a panda, such a task is far from easy.

Just look at Chi Chi.

As LIFE explained in its June 16, 1958, edition, which featured photos of 130-lb., 1.5-year-old Chi Chi, she had been acquired in Beijing by animal dealer Heini Demmer. From her cage in Frankfurt, Germany, she was then in the middle of what the magazine called “a small international trade crisis.” Zoos across the U.S. put in bids to acquire the rare creature, but a “U.S. embargo forbids all trade with China, and the Treasury Department refused to make Chi Chi an exception.” And on top of all of that, her keepers had run low on bamboo and had to try feeding her wheat and rice with sugar.

She ended up settling down halfway at the London Zoo, when the British bought her for $28,000. Because she’d been deemed “enemy goods” by the U.S., “British children can thank the Cold War that they are privileged to visit her,” LIFE joked in 1964.

But she continued to cause panda-monium throughout the 1960s. The London Zoo had been trying to set her up on a blind date with the only other captive panda living outside China at the time, An-An, who had been sent to the USSR as a token of Sino-Soviet friendship in 1959. (Both pandas were variably identified with and without their hyphens throughout the years, and An-An occasionally appeared as Ang-Ang.) But the Russians “frowned on any East-West fraternizing,” LIFE reported in the July 15, 1966, issue, so it took years to make the meeting happen. Eventually, the knowledge that panda rarity and the continuing Cold War would make it nearly impossible to acquire another panda from China, both sides agreed to temporarily put their differences aside for the sake of panda breeding.

However, despite living through the historic period of sexual revolution and women’s liberation that was the 1960s, it seemed as though Chi Chi could not care less about sex. The Nov. 11, 1966, issue of LIFE detailed the “honeymoon” in Moscow that was finally arranged for the 9½-year-old “spoiled” “spinster” and the 9-year-old “bachelor” panda who loved bubble baths. The attempt at inspiring a courtship was a disaster. “Unaware of the purpose of her visit, he flew at her in anger ‘like an arrow,’ as the Russians put it and bit her on the right side,” LIFE reported. “Though he behaved impeccably thereafter, Chi-Chi never forgave him.”

Though some humans at the time were making a conscious effort not to reproduce too much, in order to address fears about overpopulation, Chi Chi’s problem was a different one. And, in a strange twist, it turned out she was more interested in human males than male pandas. As her keeper at the London Zoo, Dr. Desmond Morris, told LIFE, “One night [during her trip to Moscow], Chi-Chi started bleating, a sure sign of interest. Imagine my surprise when we discovered she was bleating not at An-An, but at me. From that moment on, I knew it was all over. Chi-Chi was humanized.”

Or maybe Chi Chi was just more comfortable in her own digs. Two years later, An-An was allowed to pay a visit to Chi Chi in London. A photo spread in the Dec. 6, 1968, edition captured the two cavorting at one point in front of a crowd of up to 40,000 people, as the magazine reported. When she wasn’t chewing An-An’s ear, he could be seen climbing up and down poles in her enclosure. Their fling was only supposed to be just a little over two months long, but the Russians let their panda stay a while longer.

As LIFE put it, “Love might yet conquer all.”

Though the attempt to mate Chi Chi and An-An was ultimately unsuccessful, the international cooperation fostered by the animals did not pass unnoticed.

Liz Ronk edited this gallery for LIFE.com. Follow her on Twitter @lizabethronk.

Chi Chi munched on wheat, which she held in her unique six-clawed paws.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Heini Demmer, Chi Chi’s owner, lifted her from a packing box.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Chi Chi enjoyed attention from her owner.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Chi Chi, at a year and a half old and 130 pounds, was expected to become a full-grown 200 pounds by age three.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Chi Chi climbed in her cage.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Chi Chi from China, 1958.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Chi Chi from China walked on a stone wall, 1958.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Chi Chi, 1958.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Giant panda Chi Chi looked out of her cage, 1958.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Heini Demmer with his giant panda Chi Chi.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Chi Chi, 1958.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Giant panda Chi Chi looked in her cage.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Giant panda Chi Chi took a nap.

Michael Rougier The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Vintage Blizzard Photos: New York City, 1956

August 11, 2021March 14, 2017 by

On March 18, 1956, a storm hit the East Coast, blanketing the northeast corridor with snow. LIFE photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt captured these images of New Yorkers coping with the onslaught of winter weather. Though the images did not run in the magazine, the storm did make news with the tale of one New Yorker who had more trouble than most with the snow.

Al Asnis of LIFE’s photo lab happened to be waiting for the train on an El platform when he saw a man “writhing on the sidewalk below,” the magazine reported.

As LIFE described in the April 2, 1956 issue:

While preoccupied passers-by went their way, Asnis took a picture then rushed to offer his assistance just as other help arrived. The man was a 48-year-old letter carrier named Max Urkowitz who, on the way home after his rounds, had fallen, twisting his leg. He said he had heard a sharp-snap and thought the leg was broken. One man, doing a job that no novice should attempt, expertly fashioned a makeshift splint for a broken leg. Arriving after a 90 minute delay caused by the snow, an ambulance attendant admired the splint but had to remove it en route to the hospital so the patient could be examined. Instead of a fracture, it turned out, Urkowitz suffered only a bad sprain.

Blizzard in New York City, Mar. 18-19, 1956.

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

King Kong: When the Awesome One Showed His Might

January 14, 2020March 10, 2017 by

When King Kong was introduced the world in 1933, TIME described the creature as a “gigantic whatnot resembling an ape, 50 feet tall, equipped with large teeth and a thunderous snarl.” (His fur, the story noted, was made of 30 bearskins.) The whole concept of the film could have produced something entirely ridiculous, the magazine observed back then as well as in future stories about the franchise, but somehow it worked thanks to some Hollywood alchemy that filmmakers are hoping to recapture once again.

That means there have been plenty of chances for audiences to be reintroduced to Kong.

Case in point: In 1952, LIFE dispatched Alfred Eisenstaedt to photograph a screening of that original 1933 film, images from which can be seen here. The story did not run in the magazine at the time—in fact, no record could be found of why the magazine sent the photographer to that particular event or what editors intended to do with the images. It seems likely, however, that what Eisenstaedt was capturing was a screening from the theatrical reissue of the film that year, which was a prime example of the character’s proven staying power in action.

It was, as TIME described, a hit:

Hollywood, frantically casting about for a movie formula which will bring customers back into the theaters, last week agreed that one studio at least had struck pay dirt. After thriftily digging into its storehouse of possible reissues, RKO dusted off the 19-year-old King Kong, the adventures of a snarling, 50-ft. prehistoric monster who saved RKO from bankruptcy in the thirties and seems destined to gross at least $2,500,000 for his masters in 1952.

As most of Hollywood’s producers watched with envious amazement, crowds in Pittsburgh, Detroit, Cleveland, Cincinnati and Indianapolis flocked to see Kong brought back alive from a Pacific island to Manhattan, where he climbs the Empire State Building clutching the beauteous and screaming Fay Wray (now fortyish and retired). There, raging defiantly at his puny pursuers, the monster finally gets shot down by a squadron of ancient biplanes.

That 1952 take was significant (about $22.9 million in 2017 dollars), so it was perhaps no wonder that when the concept got yet another go in 1976, the images Eisenstaedt created in 1952, of a 1933 movie, were used to illustrate TIME’s cover story about the movie.

“[The original] achieved the legendary status of classic kitsch, the charm of which remained undimmed by innumerable el cheapo rip-offs and overexposure on TV. The great monkey has become a pop culture staple in everything from cartoons to ad campaigns,” the story observed.

As that place in pop culture endures, LIFE presents this look back at the staying power of the King Kong iteration that remains the monster’s milestone achievement.

Photo from a 1952 screening of the 1933 film King Kong

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock.

Photo from a 1952 screening of the 1933 film King Kong.

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock.

Remembering Harry Belafonte

April 25, 2023March 7, 2017 by

Harry Belafonte, entertainer and activist, died on April 25, 2023 of congestive heart failure at age 96.

He appeared many times in the pages of LIFE magazine, both as a performer and as a champion of civil rights. Pictures show him in a variety of settings that give testament to the breadth of his life. He was photographed on stage at the Coconut Grove nightclub, making his acting debut in the film Bright Road, and attending the 1963 March on Washington with Sidney Poitier. And the list goes on of moments in which he shared his joy and his wisdom with American audiences.

LIFE’s feature story on Belafontee from May 1957 gives a sense of how big he was as an entertainer. That story talked about how he had pulled ahead of Elvis Presley in record sales, and the first movie of his three-picture deal with Fox, Island in the Sun, was going to come out the following month. Belftonte achieved his massive success by introducing audiences to calypso music, which he did despite encountering resistance in the music business:

When I started singing the kind of folk music I do now I was told it was too special to get across. But I’d given up the idea of reaching a lot of people. I was trying to express my strong social feelings in terms of folk music, the way people of all nations have historically done. Part of my heritage is West Indian so my interest in their music—calypso—was natural.

That music propelled an amazing journey. Please enjoy this photographic tribute to Harry Belafonte.

Harry Belafonte laughed during Bop City nightclub’s opening night, 1949.

Martha Holmes/The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte in his film debut as a principal in Bright Road, 1952.

John Swope The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte singing at a recording session, 1957.

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte performed at the Coconut Grove nightclub, 1957.

Ralph Crane The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte and wife Julie at Prayer Pilgrimage for Freedom, 1957.

Paul Schutzer The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte singing, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Singer Harry Belafonte singing in his apartment, 1958.

Robert W. Kelley The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte playing guitar, 1958.

Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte playing with son David as wife Julie watches.

Martha Holmes The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Singer Harry Belafonte at a night club in 1960.

Joseph Scherschel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte and actor Sidney Poitier and folk singer Odetta at a civil rights rally at the Statue of Liberty in 1960.

Al Fenn The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte sightseeing in Israel, 1960.

David Rubinger The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Anthony Quinn with singers Ethel Merman and Harry Belafonte at President-elect John F. Kennedy’s inaugural ball, 1961.

Alfred Eisenstaedt The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Burt Lancaster, Harry Belafonte and Charlton Heston at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington D.C. for a civil rights march, 1963.

Eliot Elisofon The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte at the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, 1963.

Francis Miller The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Harry Belafonte with Julie Andrews at a party following the Broadway premiere of ‘Sound of Music’. 1965.

Bob Gomel The LIFE Images Collection/Shutterstock

Young Gloria Steinem in LIFE

March 16, 2026March 1, 2017 by

Gloria Steinem is a feminist icon whose own history in the public eye began with her career as a journalist. She was in that role when wrote a story for the Aug. 20, 1965 issue of LIFE that was a sardonic look at Pop Culture. “A thing is either widely recognizable or it isn’t,” she wrote, “and whether it is good or bad needn’t be held against it.”

At the time, Steinem was only a few years into her career as a big-name writer, having gotten a jump start in 1963 with a story for Show magazine in which she went undercover as a Playboy bunny. (She would later say that she regretted the assignment at the time, as it led editors away from thinking of her as a serious writer.) By the time this article ran in LIFE her byline had appeared in a wide range of outlets and, as TIME noted that same summer, Steinem, then 30, was the most successful example of an experiment by Glamour magazine in which the journalists also served as models.

She did the same here, posing as figures that were placed around a board game of pop culture for a fanciful graphic that accompanied her story.

While pop culture could come and go, the most enduring aspect of this story might well be the photos that were shot for it by LIFE staff photographer Yale Joel. Most of the images did not run in the magazine, but have since gained a life of their own online. The image of Steinem holding a sign with the protest slogan “We Shall Overcome” is among the top sellers of all the classic photos in the LIFE print store.

As for Steinem herself, by 1971, she had helped launch Ms. magazine and was one of feminism’s most recognizable faces. She may have had her finger on the pop pulse when she wrote for LIFE, but her In-ness proved to be anything but passing.

From “The Ins and Outs of Pop Culture,” an article by Gloria Steinem in the Aug. 20, 1965 issue of LIFE magazine. This image did not appear in the story.

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

From “The Ins and Outs of Pop Culture” an article by Gloria Steinem. This image did not appear in the story.

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Contact sheet from “The Ins and Outs of Pop Culture” an article by Gloria Steinem in the Aug. 20, 1965 issue of LIFE magazine.

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection

Her pop culture suggestions included “boning up on World War II memorabilia.”

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Steinem suggested for people who want to be In “…learning to look at and/or wearing Op Art (Dramamine helps).”

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Of going to pro football games, Steinem wrote, “try thinking of them as improvisational theater.”

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Contact sheet from “The Ins and Outs of Pop Culture.”

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection

She described skateboarding as “dangerous enough for James Bond.”

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

The end goal of the course, she wrote, was “arriving at a state so In that you can relax and forget about whether you’re in or out.”

Yale Joel The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock

Elizabeth Taylor: A Life-Changing Portrait

December 15, 2019February 27, 2017 by

Philippe Halsman, the prolific 20th-century portrait photographer, was assigned by LIFE Magazine to photograph Elizabeth Taylor for a profile story. Halsman had previously captured figures such as Marilyn Monroe, Alfred Hitchcock and Winston Churchill.

In October 1948, Taylor, who was only 16, arrived in a low-cut dress at Halsman’s New York City portrait studio, which still exists and is home to the Halsman Archive. “In my studio Elizabeth was quiet and shy. She struck me as an average teen-ager, except that she was incredibly beautiful,” Halsman reflected in his book Halsman: Sight and Insight.

Halsman had his one-of-a-kind hand-built 4×5 view camera ready to go with both black-and-white and color film.

“On a purely technical level, he pointed out that two sides of my face photographed differently,” Taylor would later recall. “One side looked younger; the other more mature. In posing for Halsman, I became instantly aware of my body.”

Taylor had worn her own dazzling earrings, but she didn’t wear a necklace. During the sitting, Halsman borrowed his wife Yvonne Halsman’s blue triangle pendant necklace and placed it around Elizabeth’s neck. This subtle decision added a level of impact to the portrait. The necklace was later passed down to Halsman’s daughter Irene.

In Taylor’s 1988 autobiography, Elizabeth Takes Off: On Weight Gain, Weight Loss, Self-Image, and Self-Esteem, she described the effect the portrait session had on her self-image: “[Halsman] was the first person to make me look at myself as a woman… After my session with Halsman, I was much more determined to control my screen image. I wanted to look older so I insisted on cutting my hair. In 1949 I went from portraying Amy in Little Women, another child-woman to playing a full-fledged romantic lead in The Conspirator. At barely seventeen, I grew up for all America to see.“

Halsman ran into Taylor a few weeks later in Hollywood and when approached by him, she couldn’t remember where they had met.

“She could have not hurt me more,” he would later reflect. “Her words showed again how important a photograph can be and how unimportant the photographer who made it.”

Color portrait of Elizabeth Taylor, Oct. 1948.

Philippe Halsman Halsman Archive

A black-and-white outtake from Halsman’s shoot with Elizabeth Taylor, Oct. 1948.

Philippe Halsman Halsman Archive

Halsman’s portrait of Taylor as it originally appeared in color the Feb. 21, 1949 issue of LIFE.

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