Art News

Maryland photographer, Stan Stearns, who shot famous John F. Kennedy Jr. photo dead at 76

WASHINGTON (AP).- The photographer who took the iconic picture of John F. Kennedy Jr. saluting his father’s coffin during the slain president’s 1963 funeral has died. Stan Stearns, 76, died Friday at a hospice in Harwood, Md. His son, Jay Stearns, said the cause was cancer. Stearns was assigned to cover John F. Kennedy’s funeral on Nov. 25, 1963, as a photographer for United Press International. He would later describe standing outside the Cathedral of St. Matthew the Apostle in Washington and being squeezed into a roped off area with 70 other photographers. Stearns stood by as the president’s flag-draped casket was loaded on to a horse-drawn caisson after the funeral. Through his telephoto lens, he watched as Jacqueline Kennedy leaned down to whisper to her son, who turned 3 years old