A newsletter for picture editors and researchers
Newsletter status
Due to a move at the end of 2004 and the beginning of 2005, a project that took up most of my time for several months, I was not able to produce a winter 2004-2005 newsletter. So, in the meantime, I've put together this online-only newsletter covering all of 2005, which had already undergone several updates.
My telephone and fax numbers did not change due to the move. And, of course, my post office box address and e-mail address are still the same. Please contact me if you need my new street address for deliveries by FedEx, UPS, DHL, or other courier services.
From a retrospective commentary on the lessons of Hurricane Camille, back in 1969, that were lost and not available to the responders to Hurricane Katrina to looks at historic railroad buildings being given a new life and a look at life on a North Carolina farm, a very diverse group of magazine projects highlighted the year 2005. A look at specific publication credits is provided at the end of this newsletter.
The new magazine HSToday [Homeland Security Today] provided an opportunity for three feature in successive issues, all with my own photos. These ranged from a look at rail transportation security issues to training for weapons of mass destruction attacks.
My speciatly of railroad and rail transit coverage figured into a number of features for different publications.
Prepare for Mozart mania as Austria gears up to celebrate the 250th anniversary of his birth
January 27, 2006, marks the 250th anniversary of the birth of Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
Austria, and particularly the city of his birth, Salzburg, will be in the spotlight all year as a variety of special events mark the anniversary. In early 2005, the Austrian tourist office was already sending out special brochures calling attention to the anniversary and related events.
(Even those not very familiar with either Austria or Mozart learned a little about both in the fictionalized 1984 biographical film, Amadeus, which won eight Academy Awards, including best picture, and which featured Mozart's music in the soundtrack. Look for that movie to show up again on television within the next year.)
Salzburg, which has always been Mozart-crazy, and where you can hardly go anywhere downtown without seeing places, businesses, and products named after Mozart, will likely go even more Mozart manic during that time.
So, perhaps it's time to remind everyone that Austria is one of my stock photo specialties, and that I have substantial coverage of Salzburg, as well as the rest of the country. (My Web site contains 10 pages of sample thumbnail images related to Austria, as well as several dozen pages with the larger versions of these images. You can access these pages on my Web site by following the "Pictures by category" link on the home page and other main pages. Not all 10 of these thumbnail pages are directly accessible through the Pictures by Category page; some secondary subjects are available via links the pages that are listed.)
And, yes, there are Mozart-related images, including the birth house in Salzburg and the colorful display windows of a Salzburg chocolate shop, where nearly every product bears the likeness of Mozart. (See below.)
011342 Salzburg chocolate shop with mostly Mozart products. (Click on the image for a larger version.)
Not only that, but since Austria's switch to the Euro currency in 2002, you can now even buy Mozart products with coins bearing the likeness of Mozart. And, yes, a page of images of Austrian-minted Euro coins is one of the 10 mentioned above. It includes images with the Mozart coin.
Though Mozart is most associated with his birth city of Salzburg, his greatest successes came at the Imperial court in Vienna. I have photos of some of those palaces, too. (Why doesn't Vienna lay more claim to Mozart? Because Vienna was associated with the work of so many important composes, including Beethoven. If any one composer is especially associated with Vienna, it's Johann Strauss, the waltz king.)
So, if you need anything Austria-related, send an e-mail or give me a call. And, I also have a large volume of reference materials relating to Austria, including preliminary plans for the Mozart anniversary celebrations, so I can produce features of almost any length fairly quickly.
Additional Salzburg, Austria, images:
Quick flashes
Artrain USA brings mobile museum to small towns with help of nation's railroads
Artrain USA is a mobile museum housed in a string of five railroad cars that travels to about a quarter of the continental U.S. each year, visiting mostly small towns.
I photographed the train at several locations during its tour in North Carolina in early 2005.
This unique cultural institution, based in Ann Arbor, Mich., has been operating since 1971 and will be touring the northeastern U.S. in late 2005 and the far west and northwest in 2006.
North Carolina Railroad Co. develops buildings for new uses, mounts major historic display
The North Carolina Railroad Co. (NCRR) is a state owned corporation that not only owns one of the state's major railroad corridors (leased to and operated by freight railroad Norfolk Southern) but also possesses a range of historic railroad structures.
The company has committed to trying to find new uses for some of these structures, and, at a minimum, stabilizing them against further deterioration.
The former Raleigh freight house has been restored externally and made available for lease. I have photos of that structure as well as the freight houses in Kinston and Goldsboro.
At the same time, in the first building restored by the NCRR, the one time engine house in Burlington, which now houses an Amtrak waiting room as well as offices, the NCRR has presented a substantial historic display, focusing on now the railroad contributed to the economic development of the state. The extensive display, in the lobby of the building, goes from the earliest days of the NCRR to the present and even the future.
In addition to exteriors of the building, I also have photos of this display. (One of my photos is used very small in one of the display panels.)
Railroad coverage adds images military transportation operations and visit by DOT secretary
In April of 2005, I spent a day at the North Carolina State Port of Wilmington, photographing a variety of large military vehicles being unloaded from a roll-on/roll-off (RoRo) ship and being loaded on railroad flat cars for movement inland. These were vehicles being returned from Iraq.
The photos at Wilmington, which add to my existing coverage of activities at the port, are part of a major project on the railroads and the military services, which is continuing in the second half of 2005. I'll report more on this project in the next newsletter.
A later trip to Fort Eustis, in Virginia, added additional military transportation subjects, including training in the handling of intermodal containers.
In February I went to Charlotte, N.C., to photograph a visit by U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta.
This was part of Mineta's "let's save Amtrak by bankrupting it" tour. [Yes, I'm prejudiced on this issue, as most of the things Mineta said in Charlotte and elsewhere about Amtrak were either not true, were gross distortions, or did not make sense at all.] While in Charlotte, Mineta toured passenger rail equipment used on the Amtrak "Piedmont" trains that is owned by the state of North Carolina.
New photos update coverage for various N.C. Cities and regions
Here's a city-by-city overview of selected new images:
Burlington, N.C.: Additional interior and exterior photos of the one-time North Carolina Railroad Co. engine shop building that has been converted into a passenger station—with available office and retail space.
Carrboro, N.C.: Images of the Libba Cotton bicycle trail. (This trail adjoins an active railroad line. There's currently much debate as to whether bicycle trails can coexist with and in active railroad corridors.)
Also, members of the McAdams family selling produce and flowers at the Farmer's Market. (See the Efland listing below.)
Charlotte, N.C.: New images of the Charlotte Trolley operation, with the new replica trolleys that have enabled the system to increase operating frequencies.
Durham, N.C.: New photos of the former American Tobacco Co. complex which has undergone a massive conversion to contemporary office space and retail use. The photos focus particularly on the artificial stream and landscaping which has given new character to this complex.
Efland, N.C.: A day on the McAdams family farm (photographed for Farm & Ranch Living magazine) that produces fruits, vegetables, and decorative flowers and which also has cows and sheep.
Greensboro, N.C.: New photos of the restored downtown train station which is now a regional transportation hub not only for trains but for local and regional bus service as well.
Hamlet, N.C.: Photos of the restored train station at its new location, now fully painted. (Supplementing earlier photos showing the train station before and during its move.)
Kinston, N.C.: New photos of signs at the Global Transpark, a state-supported business park located at the regional airport. Despite large investments by the state and the region, the controversial business park has so far failed to draw as many businesses as planners had hoped.
New Bern, N.C.: Views of the marina from a train on the Trent River Bridge; views of downtown from a train on the tracks that run down the middle of a street. This adds to substantial existing coverage of this coastal town, including historic structures and the memorial to the founder of the town.
Raleigh, N.C.: Exterior and interior images of "the Depot," a former railroad freight house that has been restored and made available for commercial use. (See the North Carolina Railroad Co. item in this newsletter.)
Wilmington, N.C.: Additional photos from the N.C. state port, showing the unloading of military vehicles from a ship and their transfer to railcars.
Train trips document NCRR; grade crossing accident
Travel on two Operation Lifesaver grade crossing safety promotion trains in late August provided an opportunity to add to coverage of the North Carolina Railroad (NCRR) Co. corridor, showing the regions along the tracks. The first trip ran between Raleigh and Greensboro; the second covered Goldsboro to Havelock, traveling through a much more rural part of the state.
Ironically, during the return leg of the second trip, the train was itself involved in a grade crossing accident when a tractor trailer drove into the path of the train. My photos show the destructive force of the impact on the 18-wheeler. (A report on that incident and a photo appeared in the news section of Trains magazine.)
Looking back: old computers
In the early 1980s, I was probably among the first five per cent of Americans to have a computer at home. As someone who had been writing for many years, I immediately saw the value of even the most basic word processing programs.
That first computer was a Radio Shack Model III—with two 5 1/4 inch floppy drives and no hard drive—and a whopping 48 K of memory. The display was entirely character-based—no graphics—and could show only 16 (if I remember correctly) lines of 64 characters. Yet, it worked for its intended purpose. I also quickly acquired a modem, that, though slow—anyone even remember 300 baud modems?—let me communicate with other systems, and by the mid 1980s, I was already using e-mail to communicate with others.
Though awkward in to use in many ways, that first computer served as a terminal for editing and compiling my first published book, Picture Sources 4, published in 1983.
The proceeds from that book, though small, went toward upgrading my equipment with better printers and eventually a faster modem.
My next book, book, Organizing Your Photographs, published in 1986, was entirely written on the computer.
Then came a Radio Shack Model 100, one of the first computers that might be described as a laptop. Though it had only a tiny display, it could operate off batteries and allowed me to write on a regular keyboard away from home, transferring the text to my Model III for further editing and formatting.
What's the point of all of this?
I not only used this equipment but I also photographed it. Though all of that early equipment has long gone to the landfill, I still have the photos of it in use—and even of myself using it.
So, if you need stock photos of very early personal computers, and someone loading a 5 1/4 inch floppy into a computer drive, I can provide those. I also have photos of mainframe computer equipment in a dedicated computer room (at a university) from that time.
It's difficult to believe, but computers from the mid 1980s are now ancient history, at least as far as the computer age goes.
Recent publication credits (2005)
Selected feature and photo credits
"The interurban: Alive and well and living in Austria." — Railfan & Railroad, March, 2005. A look at a foreign shortline that offers everything from high density transit to freight operations and historic equipment. Includes a sidebar on a winter ride on a steam loco.
"Old world rails, new world lessons: As Americans grapple with their rail system's vulnerabilities, some European solutions could help make people and commerce safer." — HSToday [Homeland Security Today], September, 2005. A critical look at what works and doesn't work in the area of railroad and rail transit security—and how emergency responders can be better prepared for a range of incidents.
"A new lease on life: The North Carolina Railroad is recycling its classic freight stations." — Railfan & Railroad, September, 2005. How the NCRR is trying to preserve and rehabilitate old buildings. Includes sidebar on NCRR historic exhibit in Burlington.
Farm & Ranch Living, Sept.-Oct., 2005: Provided photos for feature on life on a family farm in North Carolina. (The text was written by a member of the farm family.)
Cover photo for ADC map of the Raleigh, N.C., area; cover photo for ADC map of the High Point, N.C., area.
"The Lost Lessons of Hurricane Camille."—HSToday [Homeland Security Today], October, 2005. Looking back at what the military managed to do right in responding to a major hurricane in 1969, and contrasting that response with the problems of responding to Hurricane Katrina. (Cover photo and inside photos.)
"Tunnel Visions: Inside one of America's most unusual training grounds, elite units prepare for the worst."—HSToday [Homeland Security Today], November, 2005. A look at West Virginia's Center for National Response and its training facility inside an abandoned highway tunnel that tries to simulate the aftermath of a weapons of mass destruction attack.
Multiple news items for Trains magazine, including a look at how a massive power outage affected Switzerland's railroads to an incident where a railroad safety promotion train was itself involved in a railroad grade crossing incident.
Two features for Model Retailer, a hobby shop trade magazine, one looking at financial problems of noted Austrian model railroad manufacturer Roco, the other a profile of long-time German model railroad manufacturer Märklin.
[Updated 2006/01/21]
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