1. Yad Vashem collections

In time for the International Holocaust Remembrance Day (January 27), the Yad Vashem museum, with the help of Google , has opened to the public, on the web, a gallery of more than 130,000 photographs.
Composed of images taken by common soldiers, from both sides, from personal family photos, or from official photographers, it is a huge patchwork of people, places and moments. The images depict parcels of Jewish and non Jewish condition before, during and after the Nazi occupation of Europe. There is often not much more than a brief caption per image and most often hardly a date. With no obvious order between each different albums of various sizes, one can, and probably will, randomly from one to another, as if browsing through an old family album of unknown origin.
There is no commentary or analysis here: Just photographs. No need: The images speak for themselves.

http://collections.yadvashem.org/photosarchive/

2. IconicPhotos

You thought you knew everything about those famous images. Think again. The Blog IconicPhotos will set you right. Written by the mysterious “ thequintessential “, it is a treasure of knowledge, historical information and pure photographic intelligence.
The author takes iconic images, those we thought we knew everything about, and enlightens us with multiple layers of information that makes us re fall in love with them again as well as understand them even better. It is a smart thought provoking approach to photography that will leave you feeling so much more knowledgeable about the world around us.
The best part ? It stick to facts and is neither pretentious nor condescending. A “must bookmark” destination

http://iconicphotos.wordpress.com/

3. The Rachel Hulin blog

Ex photo editor at Rolling Stone magazine, Rachel Hulin caught the blogging bug while at Photoshelter as Stewardess in Chief of their “Shoot the blog”. Since then, Rachel has been flying solo on her own site, “A photography blog”. While she is more interested in Fine Art and editorial portraiture, she always succeeds in tickling your curiosity. It is fresh, informative, amusing and colorful. Rachel knows photography ( she is a photographer herself), that much is clear, but she also loves it profoundly. She share her insights, discoveries and amazement with a refreshing style that is full of invention and cleverness.
It’s a great site to discover new talents, revisit old ones and discuss the art of photography.

http://www.rachelhulin.com/blog/

Paul Melcher can be reached for comments, suggestions and anything else at pmelcher@gmail.com