Tony Duffy
2022 Honoree / Achievement in Sports
Tony Duffy was born in London in 1937, and his earliest memories were of the wartime “Blitz” by German bombers against the civilian population. Many children were evacuated from the city, including Duffy and his sister, to the north of England a few miles outside Manchester. After the war Duffy returned to the capital and grew up passionate about sports, ignited by the London Olympics in 1948. Duffy would thumb through the nine different National newspapers the next day for photos of the Games and he kept a cuttings scrapbook of his favorite photos. From the start, sports photography was imbued with a magic stardust which never left him.
Graduating from Manchester University in 1959 with a degree in law with a minor in accounting gained him deferment from being enlisted in the British military. The next 6 years Duffy called his personal “dark ages”, working in a boring accountancy office during the day, trying to study in the evenings and living for the weekends. The rest of London was “swinging” with a joyous explosion of music, fashion, photography and the arts driven by young people breaking down barriers. It was during this time Duffy bought his first 35mm camera ( a Voigtlander Vito B) using it to take travel photos and shots of any friends he was with, becoming a self-taught photographer learning by trial and error.
The Mexico City Olympics were on the horizon in 1968 and a chance to see the world’s greatest athletes in action was irresitable to Duffy. On a limited budget he found a tour which included tickets in the nose bleed section for the track events. On 18th October 1968 at the National Stadium in Mexico City, Tony found his way down to the front row of the stands and took a photograph that would forever change sports photography. It showed American long jumper Bob Beamon obliterating the previous world record by nearly two feet, spawning a new word to describe a superhuman achievement – “Beamonesque”. Athletic writers lauded it as “the greatest single athletics feat of all- time” and others as “the greatest moment in the Olympics”. Til this day, Beamon’s mark is the longest-standing Olympic athletics record and remains the only time a man has set a long jump world record at the competition.
Duffy carried the roll of film with the Beamon shot on it in his pocket for the next two days, before dropping it off at a 24 hour Photo Lab, not realizing the risk to his film. Not only was the Beamon shot was sharp and in focus, but few other photographers had got that jump and none from the head-on position. This iconic image of Bob Beamon taken by an amateur photographer from the front row at the Mexico City Olympics launched Allsport Photography. Created by Tony, together with fashion photographer John Starr and a young darkroom man Steve Powell, Allsport became regarded as the World leader in sports photography and 25 years later became part of Getty Images.
Back in those days when Britain’s national newspapers only used black & white photos, Allsport made a decision to primarily shoot in color. Duffy thought sport was so intrinsically colorful that it would lose much in monochrome. This decision luckily took advantage of the gradual change to color photography in the media, as did their success depending on hiring, training, and keeping young photographers who specialized in sport, focusing on international coverage rather than just local, in addition to giving equal coverage to Women’s sports. Tony was at the forefront to equal opportunity for Women in sport, in part with his 1983 his coffee table book “Winning Women” subtitled The Changing Image of Women in Sport’ predicted many of the changes which have since come to pass. During his illustrious career Tony’s images have graced the covers and pages of nearly every major publication worldwide covering 10 Olympic Games, World Cup Finals Soccer, Super Bowl, European Athletics & Swimming Championships, and Tennis Majors. Duffy was named the Official Photographer to the IAAF (World Athletics Federation), FINA (World Aquatics Association), and his Agency Allsport was named the Official Photography provider to the IOC (International Olympic Committee) in 1984. Duffy’s photography awards include the prestigious Royal Photographic Society & Sports Council Photographer of the Year, the AIPS awards twice, and in 1981 the International Sports Photo of the Year.
Now in his mid-eighties, Tony recently survived operations which were thought likely to have killed him and now calls life his “second go round”. He lives in the beautiful beach town of Encinitas, and enjoys friendships with many of the athletes and their families he met during his career.
Links: www.popphoto.com/american-photo/masters-olympic-photography-tony-duffy, www.gettyimages.com/photos/tony-duffy
Photo by Donald Miralle