Sid Grossman was raised in the tenements of New York City, the son of Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe. Interested in both art and politics, he became a photographer in the mid-1930s. He was a key member of the New York Photo League from 1936 to 1949. His best-known photographs of the late 1940s were made at Coney Island and on the streets of New York. Blacklisted as a communist in 1949, Grossman continued to teach privately, while making increasingly personal and poetic images. He died at the age of only 42. His prints are now held by many leading museums, including the National Gallery of Art, Washington,
D.C.; the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston; and the National Gallery of Canada.