- Ruth Orkin (1921-1985) was an award-winning photojournalist and filmmaker whose life embodied adventure and independence. The daughter of silent-film actress Mary Ruby, Orkin grew up in Hollywood's golden age and received her first camera at ten. At seventeen, she bicycled alone across the U.S. to the 1939 World's Fair, photographing her journey. After moving to New York in 1943, she worked for major magazines and photographed renowned musicians at Tanglewood, including Leonard Bernstein and Aaron Copland. In 1951, while on assignment in Europe, she met Nina Lee Craig in Florence and created her iconic photograph *American Girl in Italy*, part of the series *Don't Be Afraid to Travel Alone*. Orkin later married filmmaker Morris Engel, with whom she made the Oscar-nominated *Little Fugitive*. From her Central Park apartment, she documented New York life in her acclaimed books *A World Through My Window* and *More Pictures From My Window*.
- IMDb mini biography by: Mary Engel
- SpouseMorris Engel(1952 - January 16, 1985) (her death, 2 children)
- Children
- Daughter of Silent Film actress Mary Ruby.
- For the last 17 years of her life she was struggling against cancer, while still carrying on her career. Although many operations and treatments she underwent curtailed her ability to accept assignments, she continued to photograph, taking pictures of her two children at home and of Central Park as seen from their 15th-floor apartment. She died in her apartment on Central Park West at the age of 63. Her mother survived her by 3 years, passing away at the age of 93.
- She was one of ten winners for Life's Magazine's Contest for Young Photographers in 1951 with Dennis Stock, Robert Frank, and Elliott Erwitt.
- In the 1940's, 50's and 60's, her black-and-white photos of celebrities and street life frequently appeared in Life, Look, Collier's, and other magazines. Her six-photograph sequence of children playing cards on a city stoop was included in Edward Steichen's landmark exhibition ''The Family of Man".
- Mother of Mary Engel and Andy Engel.
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