McNair was a photographer for 50 years and was one of just a few black photographers in the ‘60s and 70s. He captured moments in history and prominent people such as Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr. He was also the father of one of the four girls lost in the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing in 1963. Upon arriving at what was let of the church that day, he took just one photograph. Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin stated that “Mr McNair and his family are forever tied to our country’s civil-rights legacy.” He was also the first African American member of the Alabama Legislature since Reconstruction.