Columbus Ave

The Early Photography of Robert E. Fulton III

The book includes 74 black and white remastered photographs that Fulton took in Boston in the early 1960s.

Robert E. Fulton III (1939-2002)
An insightful and skilled photographer, Robert Fulton graduated Harvard in the 1960s and merged his passions for flight and photography to design a camera system for his single-engine Cessna which enabled him to pilot the aircraft while operating a wing-mounted 35mm Arriflex camera, capturing incredible aerial images. He won an Emmy in 1997 for Denali: Alaska’s Great Wilderness. His last major aerial photographic work was released in 2000, the result of a year’s filming for the BBC Natural World series Andes To Amazon. In addition to his work on nature documentaries, mainstream features and music videos, Fulton made many short 16mm films (many available through Canyon Cinema), and worked with his close friend, documentary filmmaker Robert Gardner, on several projects, including Ika Hands (1988).

On May 30, 2002, Fulton died when his Cessna A-185-F crashed in Pennsylvania, an accident caused by a freak combination of thermal forces that, despite Fulton’s high level of skill as a pilot, caused the plane to break up in the sky. At the time of his death, Fulton was planning a film project with the BBC which would have involved flying around the world to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Wright brothers’ first manned flight.