Assistant Labor Secretary J. Ernest Wilkins, Jr., the first black to attend a presidential cabinet meeting, said it was an "interesting and challenging experience." Here, Wilkins is shown at the White House with other cabinet members after their meeting today. Left to right: Education and Welfare Secretary, Oveta Culp Hobby; Attorney General Herbert Brownell; Wilkins; and Vice President Richard M. Nixon, Washington DC.

On recto: typewritten title and date. On verso: manuscript title, United Press International stamp and date stamp.

Wire photographs were originally transmitted over phonelines, then later, by satellite. They were first used in the early 1920s. Associated Press became a leader with this. After pigment touch-ups, etc., the print is put into a drum (like a drum scanner). The image gets converted into audio tones that are transmitted. The tones are received and beamed onto photo-sensitive paper. Wire photographs are copies without originals---they are hybrid, transmitted objects. (Britt Salvesen, Curator and Department Head, Photography Department, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, March 30-31, 2022)

This object has the following keywords:

• Broken barriers
• Cabinet meetings
• Civil Rights Movements
• Dwight D. Eisenhower
• Group Portraits
• Herbert Brownell
• Injustice
• Jesse Ernest Wilkins, Jr.
• Jesse Ernest Wilkins, Jr.
• Oveta Culp
• Racial Discrimination
• Richard Nixon
• Washington DC
• White House
• White House

• Image Dimensions: 6 15/16 x 8 3/16 in. (17.62 x 20.8 cm) Measured by Cornejo-Reynoso, Aitzin
• Sheet Dimensions: 7 1/8 x 9 in. (18.1 x 22.86 cm) Measured by Cornejo-Reynoso, Aitzin