The Smithsonian Photography Initiative

Here’s an informative article in the New York Times about the Smithsonian Photography Initiative.

Of particular interest within the Smithsonian’s project is the series of articles called Click! Photography Changes Everything written by “one hundred experts in their fields to explore the ways photography has changed a broad spectrum of disciplines—from anthropology to astrophysics, from media to medicine, from philosophy to sports.”

Check it out! 

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The Power of One Photograph

Decades-Old Photograph Helps Solve Mystery of New York Man’s Drowning 15 Years Later

Saturday , February 02, 2008

by STEPHANIE REITZ, Associated Press Writer

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. —

A treasured old photograph, a police investigator’s long-shot appeal to the public and a retiree’s sharp memory have combined to solve a 15-year-old drowning mystery.

State police in Somers, N.Y., tried for years to identify a body found in the Titicus Reservoir on June 13, 1993, carrying 38 pounds of rocks in a backpack. The man left no clues to his name and matched no local missing-persons reports.

The only lead was a black-and-white snapshot found on the body that showed a grandfatherly man holding a small boy in the crook of his arm, both wearing attire from the 1950s or early 1960s.

Police assumed the toddler was the drowning victim, but years of investigation produced only dead ends. Then, with a few remarkable coincidences last month, Andrew Bookless got back his name.

Bookless was eventually identified through dental records — though only after police seeking to identify the little boy wrongly guessed a vintage light fixture in the picture may have been in western Massachusetts.

When they circulated the photo in the Berkshires, retired teacher Terry Yacubich, who had moved to Pittsfield from Bellport, N.Y., recognized a building behind the man and little boy as one she had known from her days on Long Island.

Bookless’ family, it turned out, once lived in the very spot the picture was taken.

“I’m not psychic or anything like that, but I think maybe Andrew worked through me to finally get some closure,” Yacubich said.

Bookless disappeared from his family’s lives years before that June day when police found him dead at 31. The snapshot was intact in a glass frame and close to his heart under layers of winter clothing.

Troopers searched for years to find someone who recognized the older man or features in the photo’s background.

Investigator Joe Fiebich sent the picture to The Berkshire Eagle newspaper in January after learning the vintage street light in the background was similar to those installed throughout western Massachusetts decades ago.

It turned out they were common on Long Island’s south shore, too.

But it wasn’t the light fixture that grabbed Yacubich’s attention when she saw the newspaper last weekend. She spotted the church auditorium in the village where she’d lived for 47 years.

“The moment I saw that picture, I knew exactly where it was,” said Yacubich, 59, who had attended decades’ worth of first Communion parties, church socials and funerals there.

Yacubich contacted friend Donald Mullins, a retired Suffolk County, N.Y., police detective and code enforcement officer in Bellport, a village in the town of Brookhaven. He trekked to the church’s neighborhood and quickly found the spot: the front corner of a now-empty residential lot.

“I stood on that very spot and said, `This is it. This is exactly it,”‘ Mullins said.

He tracked the land’s ownership history in town deeds until he found that the Bookless family had a house there before it was destroyed in a fire.

The Westchester County, N.Y., medical examiner’s office confirmed Bookless’ identity Jan. 25, and it was released this week after his four older siblings were notified.

They told police the man in the picture was Bookless’ grandfather and that his parents, John and Marianna Bookless, had died in 1994 and 2004. Police said Bookless’ family had him declared dead after his mother’s death.

Fiebich traveled Thursday to Long Island to speak to Bookless’ family in hopes of determining whether the death was accidental or suicide. Investigators believe Bookless fell through the ice in the winter of 1992-93, months before his body was found with the rock-laden pack strapped on his back.

New York State Police Senior Investigator Patrick Bosley, one of several troopers who reviewed the case over the years, tried unsuccessfully in the mid-1990s to have it featured on television’s “Unsolved Mysteries.”

“It was obvious to us all along that the picture was the best piece of information we had,” Bosley said. “It was clear that evidently the older gentleman was someone very close to him — his father or grandfather, a favorite uncle, someone he cared a lot about.”

Bookless’ family said he often would disappear for months, part of the reason his mother did not report him missing until 1999 even though she had not heard from him in several years, police said.

They said Bookless’ body was buried in New York as an unidentified person, but that his siblings would be able to move it if they wish.

“For me, the best end of the story would be to see that Andrew rests in peace,” Yacubich said.

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Wild Animal Peeve

For Pete’s sake, they’re called Canada Geese, not Canadian Geese.  Branta canadensis.  Birds don’t have a nationality!

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Rural Classified, Part II

 

I feel a mixture of amusement, horror and curiosity everytime I read the local Penny Power classified ads newspaper that serves Bucks County and the Lehigh Valley.  A sampling from this week’s edition: 

♦ PETS R KIDS TOO!  Has quality puppies, kittens, fish, small animals.  Feeders.  All animals guaranteed.  New!  Clearance bin.  New inventory arriving weekly.  Stop in and see our specials.

♦ NOW THAT WE ARE on our way into this New Year, what better way to get the year off to a good start than by having some new flooring installed!

♦ FREE REMOVAL of sawed logs, vintage stereo equipment or let’s barter for any power equipment items for firewood. 

♦ PET HOLSTEIN COW, $400.

♦ THUMBS DOWN to the person who stole two baby cars seats out of my son’s and daughter-in-law’s yard on December 30th.  You should be ashamed of yourself, to steal something that a child depends on for safety is a disgrace.  To go into someone’s yard and just walk off with things that don’t belong to you is just so wrong.  You left my grandshildren without car seats and they were unable to go visiting for the holidays.  If you don’t have a clear conscience and want to return them, please do.  If you choose not to, you are the one that has to live with yourself.  Every time you use them, just think of the children who have no car seats.  Upset Grandmother

♦ MOVIE NIGHT Sunday, January 27, 6pm.  “The Last Sin Eater.”  Cornerstone Community Church.

If you want phone numbers for the ads let me know. 🙂

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International Center of Photography

There’s a review by Holland Cotter in today’s New York Times about a new show at the International Center of Photography called “Archive Fever: Uses of the Document in Contemporary Art.”

Holland’s fascinating and glowing review has prompted me to see the show which runs from January 18 – May 4, 2008.  (I’m fortunate to live in such a beautiful, rural area with a 90-minute trip into Manhattan.) 

Holland writes: “Photography, with its extensions in film, video and the digital realm, is the main vehicle for these images. The time was, we thought of photographs as recorders of reality. Now we know they largely invent reality. At one stage or another, whether in shooting, developing, editing or placement, the pictures are manipulated, which means that we are manipulated. We are so used to this that we don’t see it; it’s just a fact of life.”

Of particular interest to me is this exhibit in the show:

“The thousands of images in a looping 36-hour slide projection by Jef Geys would seem to be linked by a firmer thread. They are a visual archive of Mr. Geys’s photographic output of 40 years. Whether they provide evidence of aesthetic development, though, or insight into the artist’s maturing mind and soul, will be known only to the most devoted of viewers.”

(Let’s see… the longest the museum is open on any single day is ten hours, and the longest anyone could realistically sit through a slide show might be three hours. So it’ll take at least 12 well-coordinated visits to see the whole thing!  With $12 admission, that’s $144, but an individual membership at $75 allows unlimited free visits.  Yay!)

Another exhibit in the show by Hans-Peter Feldmann sounds like a thoroughly intriguing study:  a room full of framed front pages of 100 international newspapers printed on Sept. 12, 2001.  To Feldman’s credit as an artist, and to Holland’s credit as a reviewer, both get past the fact that this event is still fresh to us and are able to raise all sorts of questions about image placement, text placement and the manipulation of content from country to country. 

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Rural Classified

Can you determine a newspaper’s demographics by looking through the classified ads under “Articles for Sale”?  Here are some random things I found in today’s Morning Call, a newspaper that’s delivered to my house everyday:

♦ Console Radio / 8-Track Player, $95

♦ Couch (1970 Style), $20

♦ Exercise Machine, Push/Pull Type, $50

♦ Gossip Bench, $45

♦ Kids Pool Table, $50

♦ Shotgun, Like New, $250

♦ 16′ Swimming Pool, 5′ Deep, $50

♦ Man’s Woolen Irish Sweater, Size Large, $25

♦ New Moosehead Barlight, Wall Mountable, $55

♦ Old 4 String Tenor Banjo, No Case, $100

♦ Beer Can Collection, Over 175 Cans, $300

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Inspirational Photography

I find it inspirational to study paintings and films.   I’m informed by the use of style, symbolism, craft, skill, history and light.  Ironically, I’m not often inspired by still photography.  It’s sometimes challenging to find enlightening work outside of the masters of photography, old and new. 

But as I found out this morning, a trip through The New York Times Photo Store is a real feast. You can see (and purchase!) an amazing array of images going back to the 1800s. Of particular interest is the “American Experience” category with riveting photos of American life over the last 150 years. If you’re looking for inspirational still photography, you’ve hit the jackpot.

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Some Days

I woke up refreshed and full of purpose.  I had memorized my to-do list, and knew the most efficient order.  My desk was organized and I was ready for business.

I got my son off to school and went for a four mile walk.   I was nearly home when one of the neighbors, a farmer, stopped to talk with me.  I met his new bull (Franz, 780 pounds when he was weaned) and the new puppy (Fritz, the Australian Cattle Dog, four months old).  I heard how 50 head of cattle is too much right now because the hay is running low.   I found out there are now 20 cats at the farm, but not a mouse or rat in sight even though the cats eat two bags of cat chow per week.  I learned that the farmer’s very bright son was accepted to agricultural college and starts next fall with a $7500 scholarship.  That’ll cover a small part of the $24,000 tuition.  

I know a lot about that farm and I love hearing all the news.  I got home an hour and a half later.

As I sat down to my desk, a call came in from another farmer.  I’ve been photographically documenting the process of building their new milking parlour for several months and learned that a new wall was being constructed today, and that I should get over there before the wall was finished.  I did, and it turned out the person building the wall was Mennonite, and as a rule they don’t like to be photographed.  I respect that, having grown up near Lancaster County where there’s a large Amish community. So the Mennonite man and I talked for about 45 minutes.  He was fascinated by my camera and asked many questions about it, and I was equally fascinated by his brick-laying abilities and asked him many questions.  Before he finished building the wall, he said I could take his photo as long as he was working rather than posing.

I got home an hour and a half later.

It’s 3:05 p.m. and I’ve just finished this post that should’ve been done by 10:00 a.m.  And I’ve remembered I need to buy a money order at the post office, from my good friend the Postmaster, Eileen.  I’ll make it home in time to meet the school bus at 4:00 and then start making dinner.

There’s always tomorrow.

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Veryln Klinkenborg

The first thing I look for in each new edition of the New York Times is an editorial piece by Verlyn Klinkenborg.  

Verlyn’s ongoing editorial column The Rural Life is always the best thing to read in the whole paper (which is saying something because every edition of the NY Times is a work of art). I’ve been reading Verlyn’s editorials for a few years but it was only today I realized that Verlyn is a man!  Well I’ll be jiggered!  I was going to mention her breathtakingly beautiful, deeply moving, thoroughly visual style of writing in my entry today. I’m glad I did a little research first.

Mr. Klinkenborg was born in 1952 and grew up in Iowa and California. He has a Ph.D. in English Literature from Princeton and he’s been on the editorial board of the New York Times for ten years. His work has appeared in a gazillion great magazines, he’s won many awards and a fellowship, taught literature at Harvard, and is now a visiting professor at Pomona College in Claremont, California. He’s written a few books, two of which are on my reading list: Making Hay and The Last Fine Time.

Verlyn lives on a small farm in rural upstate New York.  That’s within stalking distance of Durham Township, right?

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Meaningful Spending

I read an excellent article by Kathy Kristof in the Morning Call newspaper yesterday called “Resolve to Spend Your Money on Things that are Truly Meaningful.”  Here’s what stood out to me:

♦ Close your eyes for two minutes and think about what makes you happy.  What gives you energy and fulfillment? Are you in a room full of stuff or a room full of friends? Are you in the wilderness? At a resort?

♦ How close is this to how you live your life?

♦ The room you’re sitting in is probably full of stuff that has to be paid for.  And the picture in your mind might be about people and experiences, not stuff.

♦ Everyone has limited spending power.  When you buy one thing, you’re giving up another.  Are you happy with your choices?

♦ If you don’t have a values-based system to filter the hundreds of marketing messages you get everyday, you can get pulled into acquiring stuff out of habit.  Starbucks on the way to work everyday, for example.  ($5 x 250 days = $1250!)  It’s faster to buy coffee than brew it, but is your life’s goal to get to the finish line first?  Make sure your habits aren’t robbing you of the chance to reach more precious goals.

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Resolutions

Never mind that if you spell “resolution” backwards, the ending is “loser.”

I always make one New Year’s resolution in October.  By January 1st, I know whether it’s viable or not and I don’t torture myself afterwards.  That seems like a fine way to start a fresh year.

Based on a poll of 1,000 Americans over the age of 18, about 70 percent make New Year’s resolutions.   The majority vow to lose weight (28%) or work out more (12%).  The others say they’ll quit smoking, save money, get a new job or eat healthier.  One in four say they are “very successful” at keeping their resolution.   Half are “somewhat successful.”

The ones who succeed track their progress by charting and recording their behavior. The more specific the better — a measurable goal is key.  Additionally, they set goals that are reasonable to achieve. 

My resolution in October 2007 was to start a second blog and so far, so good!   The “charting and recording” portion is built into the blog format so that’s one less thing to labor over.  And it feels reasonable to scribble down thoughts from my over-active brain a few times a week.

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Greetings from Durham Township, Pennsylvania

Happy New Year and welcome!

I’ve maintained a photoblog at www.durhamtownship.com for the last five years.  I’ve loved every minute of it and now I’m starting a second blog to polish my writing skills.

I’ll write about my work and my life, my influences and inspirations, and offer opinions about art, film, photography, literature, music, politics, American life and whatever seems worth scribbling about.

Hope you’ll drop by often!  Please join the discussion by leaving a comment.

— Kathleen

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