C. Thomas Hardin

C. Thomas Hardin is a 1963 Centre College graduate. He started to work at the Louisville Courier-Journal and Louisville Times the morning after graduation.

He spent twenty-eight years at the Louisville newspapers as a staff photographer, Sunday Magazine photographer and as director of photography (for eighteen years). He and the photo staff were awarded a Pulitzer Prize for their coverage of Louisville’s court-ordered busing – the first photo staff ever to receive a Pulitzer. A C-J photographer also received another Pulitzer for local reporting. Hardin also shared in an additional Pulitzer and was director of photography for all three. He left the C-J, and after almost four years, retired from The Detroit News in 1996.

He has edited several books including: Over Kentucky: 40 years of Aerial Photography by Billy Davis and Rain and Ruin, covering the March, 1997 floods in Kentucky and Indiana as photographed by Courier-Journal staffers. Most recently, he edited a history of Centre College: Our Standard Sure, Centre College Since 1819.

Hardin has taught at many workshops including the Kalish Workshop for picture editors and the Mountain Workshops (for over 30 years). He was a Hearst Journalism Championships judge for 13 years. He is a past president of the National Press Photographers Association, and currently, is the president of the National Press Photographers Foundation.

He is married to 1962 Centre graduate Mary Clyde Callaway Hardin. They have two daughters: Lindy Chapman (Centre class of 1989) and Lyle Browne and six grandchildren.