The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan

In February 1963, Bob Dylan was about to release his second album, The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan. He was living at the time in a studio apartment at 161 West 4th Street near the corner of Jones Street. Columbia Records sent staff photographer Don Hunstein to shoot the cover. Dylan’s girlfriend at the time, Suze Rotolo was living with him and joined the shoot.

Hunstein later said “Well, I can’t tell you why I did it, but I said, just walk up and down the street. There wasn’t very much thought to it. It was late afternoon – you can tell that the sun was low behind them. It must have been pretty uncomfortable, out there in the slush.”

With all the elaborately produced album covers over the years, this one in its simplicity with Dylan hunched over and Rotolo clinging to him as they walk down Jones Street has remained one of the iconic images of 20th Century music.

Follow in the footsteps of Bob Dylan on our Secrets of Greenwich Village Tour.

Did you notice that there were no trees on Jones Street at the time?