On the next page of Life’s coverage there are three other shots of the Canterbury gathering. Each of the two smaller photographs in the upper left hand corner feature the political gatekeepers, the party chieftains in New Hampshire: then-Governor Sherman Adams,[11] as well as former Governor Blood. The shots seem to have fulfilled the reigning ideology: these are the men that count. Ex-Governor Blood is pictured in a conspiratorial huddle with other politicos in the hall.

This is the same ideology guiding Alfred Eisenstaedt’s images that appear on the next-to-last page of the Life coverage. The reader sees a crowded portrait gallery of who’s who, the dealmakers, the community leaders whose views are echoed in the institutions they represent and the communication structures they control. Two editors of prominent local publications are featured, two heads of private educational institutions, and a pair of up-and-coming lawyers. All of them are shown in formal settings at work, and dressed for the office.

Neither Eisenstaedt, nor the editors of Life, was wrong in thinking that all of these men wield power in the state, but it is a limited view of the process that Larsen, was trying to depict for the readers of the magazine. The election wasn’t going to be won solely on the basis of the opinions of political leaders.

Larsen chose to remind readers that it was still the voter who would cast the ballot. When one of the Canterbury cabal steps forward to argue his case for a job as an Eisenhower delegate at the Republican national convention, Larsen had an opportunity to frame the appeal to the audience. Not everyone in the front row of onlookers is convinced.