The Carroll County Historical Society is hosting a unique concert experience next weekend centered around a well-known war photographer’s brief stay in Carroll County nearly 80 years ago. Charlie Maguire, a singer-songwriter and historian, was researching Robert Capa and learned he had spent a week in Carroll County at the Pratt family farm in 1946. Capa made his name documenting the realities of war, and Maquire says his time at the small farm near Glidden must have seemed surreal.
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Capa covered five major conflicts from 1936 until his death in 1954, including the Spanish Civil War, the Second Sino-Japanese War, and, most notably, World War II. Capa was the only civilian photographer to land on Omaha Beach with American soldiers on D-Day. Maguire says the thought of a man who had documented so much bloodshed spending a week in Carroll County in the heart of the country inspired him to write a song, “Robert Capa Goes to Iowa.” Here’s a sample from that tune.
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Maguire recently visited the Pratt family farm, and he says it has mostly stayed the same from the photos taken in 1946.
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Maguire will perform at Carroll’s United Methodist Church on Sunday, Sept. 10, beginning at 2 p.m. Admission to the show is a free-will donation to the Carroll County Historical Society. Learn more about Maguire and his work by logging on to www.charliemaguire.com, a link to which is included with this story on our website.
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