I grew up with the stories of real people (students and scholars of the past times) being able to memorize things by just hearing or reading them once.
Because it's a myth. Photographic memory isn't real. Check out the wikipage on eidetic memory. People that claimed it in the past were not telling the full truth. There are only a few examples of savants being able to recall specific things after one showing, but it's terribly narrow. Like being able to draw a horse you saw, but not human faces.