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On May 1, 1947, Evelyn McHale leapt to her death from the observation
deck of the Empire State Building.
Photographer Robert Wiles took a photo of McHale
a few minutes after her death

The photo ran a couple of weeks later in Life magazine
accompanied by the following caption:

On May Day, just after leaving her 23-year-old Evelyn McHale wrote a note.
‘He is much better off without me … I wouldn’t make a good wife for anybody,
Then she crossed it out. She went to the observation platform of the Empire State Building.
Through the mist she gazed at the street, 86 floors below. Then she jumped.
In her desperate determination she leaped clear of the setbacks and hit a United Nations
limousine parked at the curb.
Across the street photography student Robert Wiles heard an explosive crash.
Just four minutes after Evelyn McHale’s death Wiles got this picture of
death’s violence and its composure.

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