Rocco Morabito, Pulitzer Prize Winner of 1968

Rocco Morabito, aka “Rocky Morabito”, is nowadays a 87-year-old resident of Jacksonville, Fla.

Forty years ago, Rocco gained everlasting notoriety winning the Pulitzer Prize for this picture, later title “The Kiss of Life”:

Rocco Morabito's Pulitzer Prize winning photo

It shows lineman J.D. Thompson resuscitating fellow worker Randall G. Champion. The story behind the picture can be found in this 1997 article on the Florida Times – Union.

The life of Rocco Morabito has recently become the subject of a documentary by the Jacksonville Historical Society. A 5-minute extract is available here.

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There are several pictures of Rocco available on the web, including this 1988 visit to Champion (who died in 2002), together with Thompson:

Rocco Morabito and J.D. Thompson visiting Randall Champion in 1988

This is Rocco in 2006, pictured with one of his old cameras:

Rocco Morabito in 2006

And here’s Rocco Morabito just a few months ago, in April 2008, as his picture was included in an interactive exhibit at the Newseum in Washington, DC:

Rocco Morabito in April 2008