Lee Balterman (American, 1920- ) was born at Augustana Hospital in Chicago. After graduating high school in 1938, he went on to take evening classes in drawing and painting at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago - the only formal training of his career. In 1942 Lee enlisted in the US Army Reserves and entered WWII. He was stationed first in England, then in Clichy, France, where worked as a hospital aide and later as an official photographer. After his discharge in 1946, Lee returned to Chicago and established a home and studio at 920 North Michigan Ave. Throughout the next three decades he worked as a freelance photographer, accepting numerous assignments from the Globe, Rapho-Guillumette, and Black Star agencies and executing covers for periodicals such as Life, Fortune, and Sports Illustrated. In the 1980s he began to disengaged from the world of editorial photography and indulge himself exclusively in his own projects. At 86, he continues to live and photograph almost daily in Chicago.