Google Doodle celebrates first female war photojournalist to report from the frontline
You might not be altogether familiar with the face on today's Google Doodle. But, you should be.
Gerda Taro, who's depicted in the doodle, is considered to be the first female journalist to report from the frontline. She was a fearless pioneer who tragically died in the field when reporting on the Spanish Civil War.
Today 1 August 2018, marks 108 years since her birth in Stuttgart, Germany in 1910.
Per a Google blog, Taro "moved to France shortly after Adolf hitler was appointed the chancellor of Germany 1933." There, she learned the rudiments of photography from fellow refugee Robert Capa.
Though her career was short-lived, she was well-known for her "fearless reportage."
"By the age of 26, her searing battlefield images made her a household name, even though many of those images were misattributed to Capa," reads the Google blogpost.
In July 1937, Taro was killed near El Escorial, near Madrid, while photographing scenes form the frontline of the Spanish Civil War.
"Here’s to Gerda Taro, who had a photographer’s eye, a journalist’s soul, and a warrior’s courage," the post continued.
Rachel Thompson is the Features Editor at Mashable. Rachel's second non-fiction book The Love Fix: Reclaiming Intimacy in a Disconnected World is out now, published by Penguin Random House in Jan. 2025. The Love Fix explores why dating feels so hard right now, why we experience difficult emotions in the realm of love, and how we can change our dating culture for the better.
A leading sex and dating writer in the UK, Rachel has written for GQ, The Guardian, The Sunday Times Style, The Telegraph, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Stylist, ELLE, The i Paper, Refinery29, and many more.
Rachel's first book Rough: How Violence Has Found Its Way Into the Bedroom And What We Can Do About It, a non-fiction investigation into sexual violence was published by Penguin Random House in 2021.
