Services to be held for Counts

Photographer Will Counts, who captured on film the bitter conflict over racial desegregation in Arkansas, and later taught generations of journalists the importance of images in chronicling the news, died of cancer Saturday.\nCounts, 70, taught at IU for 32 years, retiring in 1995. He had lived in Bloomington since 1960.\nVisitation will be Thursday 4-6 p.m. at First United Methodist Church, 219 E. 4th St., Bloomington. A sampling of his photos will be displayed. A memorial service will be held Friday at 4 p.m. at the church.\nBefore turning to teaching, Counts worked as a photographer-editor for the Arkansas Democrat in Little Rock and for The Associated Press in Chicago and Indianapolis.\nHe was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in 1958 for photographs he took during the heated desegregation battle at Little Rock Central High School.\nCounts is survived by his wife, Vivian, of Bloomington; his daughter, Claudia, a former Associated Press enterprise photo editor of New York and her husband Charles Troyer, also of New York ; a son, Wyatt Counts, of New York City; a stepdaughter, Katie Lattimer, of Bellefontaine, Ohio; a stepson, Bob McRae, of Nashville, Tenn.; a nephew, Christopher Counts; and two step-grandchildren, Andrew and Christian Lattimer, of Bellefontaine.\n"I am very saddened by the passing away of such a wonderful person as Will," said John Ahlhauser, a close friend and a retired journalism professor. "I was full of admiration for what he has accomplished. He was an exciting person to know, always on top of the news and innovative in the way he presented it"