Newhall acknowledged both Weston’s and Adams’ help in preparing the 1937 (History of Photography) show. Moholy-Nagy and Man Ray (both adopted as ‘Americans’ for the purpose of history) also ‘assisted’. All these practitioners found themselves in the enviable position of helping to write themselves into history. I am not suggesting a conspiracy theory, but I simply want to emphasise that a small, all-powerful, museum-backed clique fashioned the medium’s ‘aesthetic history’.