Jasper Wood (January 2, 1921 – June 7, 2002) was an American self-taught writer, photographer active 1945–1960, and free-speech activist. Biography Jasper Wood was born in Wilmington, North Carolina, son of Attorney Lehman Wood. In 1936 his family moved to Cleveland. He attended Cleveland Heights High School and in 1938, as a 17-year-old senior he acquired rights to publish Ernest Hemingway’s film script for his narration of The Spanish Earth on the Spanish Civil War, which Wood promoted in his introduction as Hemingway’s greatest contribution, though they had a disagreement when the author insisted on a disclaimer on the title page of the book. Film critic W. Ward Marsh wrote a vehement defence of Wood in Cleveland's The Plain Dealer. Wood enrolled at Cleveland College in 1939, where he continued his interest in writing as assistant editor of Sky Line, the school's literary magazine. He wrote poetry and a play, and was the local jazz critic for DownBeat magazine in the 1940s. He survived by taking short-term jobs and in 1943 was employed in the advertising department of The Plain Dealer. Photographer Through a colleague, in 1944 Jasper met Nancy Manning, daughter of artist Wray Manning and co-director of the 1030 Gallery. They had their first child, Denis, in 1945 and the family traveled to Mexico while Wood worked on his first novel, and entranced by the indigenous tribes in the small villages surrounding Acapulco, Cuernavaca and San Cristóbal de las Casas, he took his first photos. The next year Wood purchased a 35 mm Contax II rangefinder camera and started taking pictures in Cleveland and in Ohio's Amish country. Recognition He first exhibited his work in 1947 at the Cleveland Museum of Art's annual May Show, the first of subsequent May show awards; in 1949, 1951, 1953 and two honourable mentions in 1947, 1952. In the meantime Wood began writing reviews of local jazz musicians for the Cleveland Press and Downbeat Magazine, and made a regular income as an advertising agent. Curator Edward Steichen chose Wood’s photograph of a pensive barefoot Mexican girl hurrying with her empty basket past a wooden door for the 1955 world-touring the Museum of Modern Art exhibit The Family of Man, seen by 9 million visitors. Woods had been included in a previous MoMA show Photographs by 51 Photographers August 1 to September 17, 1950. The Scovill photographs Around 1949 Wood and his young