1920 June
Marion Warren is born in Wheat Basin, Montana

1921
Family moves to Sikeston, Missouri

June
Twin brother, Louis Hail, dies

1922 January
Mother, Lois Banfill Warren, dies of pneumonia; older brother, Dwight, moves to St. Louis to live with maiden aunt, Edna Warren; father, William Charles Warren, and Marion move in with paternal grandparents

1927
Moves with father and grandparents to a farm six miles outside of Sikeston

1930 March
Family moves to another farm in Farmington, Missouri; grandmother dies en route in a freak automobile accident. Lives for eight months with his father, his father’s new wife and her daughters

1932
Moves to St. Louis, Missouri to live with his aunt, Edna Warren, and his older brother, Dwight

1938
Buys first camera, an Argus, for $12.50. Graduates from Ben Blewett High School, and buys a second Argus, a Model C, for $25. Enrolls for five months in the Hadley Vocational School to take photography courses

1939
Completes one-semester course in photographic chemistry at St. Louis University. Completes one year in advertising photography, Washington University. Works for six months for Washington University Medical School making lantern slides, printing x-rays, and shooting anatomical specimens for lecture purposes. Works for three months as a portrait negative retoucher at the Sydney Ashan-Brenner Studio at a rate of $10 per week. Buys used Speedgraphic 4x5 view camera for $10

1940
Purchases second Speedgraphic camera from Sears, Roebuck & Co. catalog for $110.00. Freelances as a news and commercial photographer. Begins work at Day Studio at $15 per week’ assignments include fashion, advertising, commercial, and publicity photography. Joins the Associated Press for six months as a photographer and wirephoto operator at $34 per week

1942
“Coming Home” and “Muggin,” hung in the Annual Photographic Salon of Greater St. Louis in the City Art Museum

July
Joins the U.S. Navy, attached to the Office of Public Relations in Washington, D.C. Responsibilities include operating a portrait studio and publicity assignments at various bureaus and departments, and at the White House

1943 October
Marries Mary Giblin, a WAVE, in Washington, D.C.

1945 November
Sails to Europe aboard the USS Lake Champlain; visits Naples and Paris, resigns from Navy

1946-1947
Employed as a portrait photographer with Harris & Ewing Studios in Washington, D.C.

1946-1951
Collaborates with yachtsman Carlton Mitchell on books and magazine articles

1947 October
Moves to Annapolis, Maryland at the request of Carlton Mitchell; opens portrait and commercial studio in basement of home at 103 South Cherry Grove Avenue

1949 January
Wins the 1948 Graphlex Picture of the Year award with “The Band is Coming.” Begins a long association with the State of Maryland, making photographs for the Department of Information

1952-1966
Serves as official state photographer for the Department of Information; travels extensively documenting life throughout Maryland

1954-1959
Operates studio on second floor of building at 5 State Circle. Establishes reputation in architectural photography with innovative technique of inserting a photograph of the model for Charles Center into an aerial photograph of Baltimore, leading to many assignments over the years form architectural firms and Fortune magazine. Joins American Society of Magazine Photographers (ASMP). Purchases first Leica 35mm camera and begins to shift emphasis of work from black and white to color photography

1958-1962
Relocates studio to 88 State Circle. Begins a twenty-year association with Eastern Stainless Steel Corporation as photographer for Stainless World magazine; Serves as first photo editor and photographer for Maryland magazine; Travels extensively on the east coast and in the midwest photographing colleges, universities, hospitals, and churches for fundraising publications.

1963
Moves home and studio to 1935 Old Annapolis Boulevard; shifts focus of business to commercial, industrial and architectural work; virtually ceases making portraits

1970
Publishes first book, Annapolis Adventure, with wife, Mary

1973
Receives an award from Historic Annapolis, Inc. “in recognition of his contribution to the preservation of Annapolis and his superlative skill in photography and learned eye for the aesthetic value of fine architecture.”

1975-1984
Spends considerable time and effort working with vintage photographs of Maryland taken c. 1840-1940

1976
The Train’s Done Been and Gone: An Annapolis Portrait, 1859-1910 published

1979-1987
With his wife Mary, establishes The M. E. Warren Gallery of Photography at 48 Maryland Avenue to merchandise his fine art photographs

1981
Everybody Works But John Paul Jones: A Portrait of the U.S. Naval Academy, 1845-1915 published

1983
Baltimore: When She Was What She Used to Be, 1850-1930 published

1984
Maryland Time Exposures, 1840-1940 published

1985
Concentrates on The Bay Project, an effort to document the critical condition of Chesapeake Bay; buys Hasselblad medium format camera and decides to pursue The Bay Project in black and white for archival and aesthetic reasons. His effort to visually document every aspect of the Chesapeake and its watershed resulted in his seventh book, Bringing Back the Bay.

1987
Marion Warren donates over 100,000 black-and-white negatives to the Maryland State Archives, assuring that his legacy would be properly cared for and enjoyed for generations to come.

1990
Then Again: Annapolis, 1900-1965 by daughter Mame Warren (with Marion) published

1998
Governor Glendening bestowed Marion Warren the title “Admiral of the Chesapeake.”

1999
Marion establishes his official MEWarren website through The Annapolis Publishing Company

2001-2003
A cover article in The Washington Post Magazine generated a renewed interest in Marion Warren’s photography and in August 2001 an exhibit entitled The Photography of Marion E. Warren: A Retrospective Vision opened in The Mitchell Gallery at St. John’s College in Annapolis. The exhibit drew a record crowd to its opening reception.
It was during this period that Marion selected Joanie Surette as his business partner and together they began a collaboration with Richard Olsenius to produce, in Marion’s words, “the most superb carbon prints of my work.” The results were shown in December, 2003, at an exhibit of Marion’s new archival color photographs introducing the public to selections of his work that few knew existed.

2005 August
Marion Warren deemed Annapolis Publishing worthy of housing his largest collection of original photographs, thus making it possible for us to continuously offer an ever-growing number of admirers unparralleled access to his rare collection. His images capture the precious past of Annapolis, and life on the Chesapeake Bay. It is here, at 14 State Circle, where Marion’s work provides residents and visitors alike a rare opportunity to slide their hands into a pair of white gloves and select their very own silver gelatin photograph developed by Marion Warren in his darkroom, with his own hands, one print at a time. The photographs in his collection of silver gelatin prints were taken between 1945 and 1995.

2006
Well into his eighty-sixth year, Marion worked almost daily with his favorite images taken throughout his more than sixty-year career.

Marion E. Warren
June 1920 – September 2006
From the farms of rural Missouri where he grew up to the deck of a skipjack plying the choppy waters of the Chesapeake, Marion Warren has borne witness to his time and his place and we are all the richer for his vision.