Walter Reuter (1906-2005) was born in Germany. He fled Germany in 1933 for Spain, and in 1936 he joined the Republican forces fighting Franco, while also working as a photo correspondent for several wire services. After Franco gained power, Reuter fled to France, where he was placed in a concentration camp. He escaped the camp, fled to Morocco, was recaptured by French authorities, escaped again, and managed, along with his wife and son, to escape on a boat heading to Mexico where they arrived in 1942. He established himself in Mexico City, where, using modern photojournalistic techniques, he began, among other projects, documenting Mexico's indigenous people. This project eventually consisted of over 35,000 photographs of twenty different ethnicities. In addition to still photography, Reuter produced a number of full length films, both documentary and dramatic. It is estimated that Reuter produced close to 97,000 negatives during his career; he lost possession of his first archive when he fled Germany, and his second when he fled Spain.