Who took the best-known photograph of a sailor kissing a woman in New York on V-J Day?

Alfred Eisenstaedt took the best-known photograph of a sailor kissing a woman in New York on V-J Day.

Eisenstaedt photographed the scene in Times Square on August 14, 1945, as crowds gathered in anticipation of news that Japan had surrendered. Life magazine published the image, which became one of the most recognizable photographs associated with the end of World War II.

The woman was later identified as Greta Zimmer Friedman, a dental assistant, and the sailor as George Mendonsa. The image was long described as a nurse being kissed, but Friedman was not a nurse. She wore a white uniform, which helped create that common misunderstanding.

A second photographer, Navy lieutenant Victor Jorgensen, captured the same moment from another angle. His photograph was published in The New York Times under the title “Kissing the War Goodbye.” The two images are often confused, but Eisenstaedt’s version is the famous Life magazine photograph.