John Hall, director of AP's State Photo Center, dies at 74
WASHINGTON (AP) - John Hall, who ended a 41-year journalism career as director of The Associated Press' State Photo Center, has died. He was 74.
Hall died Saturday at his home in Quincy, Illinois, said his widow, Marion. A cause of death was not provided.
Hall worked at Texas, Oregon and Florida newspapers before he joined the AP's Washington bureau in April 2001 as assistant chief of bureau for photos. Hall served in that capacity for five years, overseeing the news cooperative's photojournalism in the nation's capital.
In August 2006, he was named director of the State Photo Center, the AP's central editing hub handling the photo reports for all 50 states. Hall retired after the center closed in late 2007.
"John" Ellie M. Hall was born in Jackson, Tennessee, on Aug. 23, 1943. He eloped with Marion Gordon, his high school sweetheart, on Dec. 19, 1960. He passed away one month before they would have celebrated their 57th wedding anniversary.
Hall attended Tennessee State University and the University of Colorado, and worked briefly in radio before following a lifelong passion for photography that was fostered after his mother gave him his first camera when he was 6. He continued to shoot photos up until the final month of his life.
He began his photojournalism career as a staff photographer at the former Colorado Springs Sun. He also worked at the Gazette Telegraph in Colorado Springs.
Hall was staff photographer, photo editor and managing editor for photos and art at the Dallas Times Herald in Texas, which ceased publication in 1991. He also managed photo departments at The Oregonian in Portland, Oregon, and at the Sun Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Hall is also survived by a son, a daughter-in-law, 10 grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren.
Marion Hall said she planned to spread her late husband's ashes in the Florida Keys, one of many places Hall liked to go sailing.
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