Tom Kelley’s interesting career spans more than four decades: first started as an apprentice in a New York photo studio that catered to the city's upper 400 (i.e. photographing the Vanderbilts, the Astors, the Harrimans, the Morgans, etc.). One of his biggest spot news assignments was covering the Lindbergh kidnapping case.
Coming to California, Kelley was retained to photograph the stars created by David 0. Selznick and Samuel Goldwyn including Ingrid Bergman. A few of his other most famous subjects have been Gary Cooper, Greta Garbo, James Cagney, Clark Gable, Winston Churchill, Bob Hope, Marlene Dietrich, Joan Crawford, Jack Benny, John F. Kennedy, Dwight D. Eisenhower, Franklin D. Roosevelt and, of course, Marilyn Monroe, with and without clothes. His easiest photo subject? Clark Gable. His toughest? Joan Bennett.
Following a long and profitable career helping to publicize motion picture personalities, he drifted the commercial advertising/photography field where he has remained as one of the leading exponents in the business. Of course, his most famous image was of Marilyn Monroe nude. It brought Kelly untold fame and proved to be the catalyst in the sexual revolution. His son, Tom Kelley, Jr., nows run his father's Archives.
For more information about Tom Kelley, Sr., please visit his web site.