About 

Mike Maple is an American photographer and photojournalist, renowned for his candid images. Born in Kansas City and growing up in New Mexico, Mike began taking photographs in high school after his family moved to Germantown, TN. At 18, he moved to New York where he worked at Time-Life as an assistant to some of the world’s most famous photographers. It was at Time Inc. where he found his calling, documentary photography.

Mike returned to Memphis to attend Memphis State University while working part-time as a photographer at the Memphis Press-Scimitar. At the age of 20, he was assigned by NEWSWEEK to cover Ronald Reagan’s 1976 presidential campaign and by the age of 21 had become a full-time professional photojournalist.

Over the following years, Mike began to work mainly for TIME, LIFE, Sports Illustrated, People, Newsweek, and a host of French and German news magazines. By the age of 25 he had become an accomplished veteran in the highly competitive world of magazine photography. 

Mike continued to freelance full-time for the world’s top news organizations until 1989 when he returned to Memphis to work at The Commercial Appeal. He retired in 2013 after 24 years as a staff photographer, covering many of the most significant events in recent Memphis and mid-south history.

In 2018, Mike donated his archives to the Briscoe Center for American History at the University of Texas. The effort required a semi-truck and a team to carefully package up decades of film and negatives. Today he resides in southern Oregon, and is represented by agencies in New York and Paris.