Auctions | June 29, 2026

Pulitzer Prize-Winning Photographs to Auction

Heritage Auctions

Max Desfor's Flight of Refugees Across Wrecked Bridge in Korea (1951 Pulitzer Prize)

Photography was established as a Pulitzer category in 1942, then divided in 1968 into Feature Photography honoring in-depth visual storytelling and Breaking News Photography which recognizes powerful images captured during unfolding events.

Heritage Auctions' July 1 sale will focus on Pulitzer Prize-winning photographs spanning nearly four decades of American and world history, the original photographs used in the making of the book Moments: The Pulitzer Prize Photographs by Sheryle and John Leekley, Crown Publishers, New York. These photographs were printed exclusively for the authors by the actual Pulitzer Prize-winning photographers. When that was not possible, they were supplied by printing labs of the media companies they worked for at the time of the award. 

Highlights include: 

* Joe Rosenthal's Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima (1945 Pulitzer Prize) - Rosenthal’s image of U.S. Marines raising the American flag on Mount Suribachi during the Battle of Iwo Jima was immortalized in the Marine Corps War Memorial in Arlington, Virginia

* Max Desfor's Flight of Refugees Across Wrecked Bridge in Korea (1951 Pulitzer Prize) - captured during the Korean War, this depicts desperate civilians crossing the shattered remains of a bridge amid the chaos of conflict. 

* Robert H. Jackson's Jack Ruby Shoots Lee Harvey Oswald (1964 Pulitzer Prize) - taken inside the Dallas police headquarters two days after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy

* Eddie Adams's Street Execution of a Viet Cong Prisoner, Saigon (1969 Pulitzer Prize) - Adams’ shocking photograph of the execution of a Viet Cong prisoner during the Vietnam War

* John Filo's A God-Awful Scream (1971 Pulitzer Prize) - taken moments after the Kent State shootings, Filo's photograph is of a young woman crying out over the body of a student

* Nick Ut's The Terror of War (1973 Pulitzer Prize) - Ut’s image of children fleeing a napalm attack in Vietnam