BAYOU FISHERMAN
(In The Beauty of Nature portfolio.)
I grew up in northeast Louisiana, but never really photographed the local bayous before I moved to Colorado in 1976. After becoming interested in nostalgic, moody subjects, I recalled the photographic potential of the bayou Cypress trees hung with Spanish Moss, and so on trips back home to visit my parents I started making trips out to a local bayou in search of a dramatic image.
At certain times of the year in Louisiana, early mornings are quite foggy, and I was hoping for such a foggy setting on one of my trips to possibly give me the image I had in mind. Finally, such a morning dawned, and I headed out and, after checking out several locations while keeping my fingers crossed the fog would not burn off before I located a good setting, I found this scene.
The locals frequently fish from the banks at this location and others along the many bayous in Louisiana, but on this weekday morning there were no fishermen to be seen. Or so I thought. It was only weeks later while making prints that I noticed the figure of the stork perched on a cypress limb, watching the surface for fish or other small aquatic creature it could make a meal of. (Look closely at the right side of the third tree from the left, on the limb about half-way up.)
I used 35mm T-Max 3200 film for its high grain, and added the blue toning when making the final print to further enhance the “mood” of a foggy, nostalgic scene like this.
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(In the Railroading portfolio.)
Steam locomotives have always been a big favorite with train enthusiasts, but steam was phased out of main line service in the 1950s and 60s, and now exists only on tourist railroads. Close behind steam locomotives in popularity are early diesel units, which started appearing in the 1940s. One of the more popular of these “first generation” diesels is the “EMD F unit” (EMD is General Motor Corporation’s Electro Motive Division; and “F” stands for freight unit). F units are also commonly called “cab units” or “covered wagons” by railfans because of their appearance.
In the 1980s, I was heavy into writing articles and photo-stories for railroad magazines. On one of my bi-annual trips home to visit my parents in northeast Louisiana, my good friend Bob Karsten had taken me over to near-by Gibsland, a small town off Interstate 20 that is the home terminal of the Louisiana & North West RR, which at the time was using a fleet of the old EMD F units. (Gibsland also gained some fame in the 1930s when lawmen finally tracked down and killed the outlaws Bonnie and Clyde near the town.)
A few years previously, Bob had written an article for a train magazine on this railroad and these locomotives, and on a subsequent trip home, I got the idea to also write an article on this railroad, for a different train magazine. But where-as Bob’s article dealt with the operations of the railroad, my article would have a photography focus. At the time, I faithfully carried one of Olympus’ XA pocketable cameras with me everywhere I went, and I felt an article on train photography using just this one little camera would be a good subject for railfans.
The L&NW operates over a 60 odd mile stretch of track between Gibsland, LA and McNeil, in southern Arkansas, interchanging with the Cotton belt RR (now part of Union Pacific RR) in McNeil; and with other local railroads in Gibsland. I planned my itinerary to be in McNeil in the early morning to catch the L&NW railroaders assembling their train at the interchange point with the Cotton Belt, then I would “chase” (a railfan term) the train back south to Gibsland, photographing it along the way as it served local industries along the line. This would give me a variety of photos to illustrate the article with, in which I would describe how I took advantage of the camera's "all-in-one" design while getting around its limitations (very few manual controls, fixed lens, etc.) to obtain good train photos.
I arrived in McNeil while the morning fog was still thick. Scouting out the location while I waited for the train crew to arrive, I envisioned a photo somehow utilizing the railroad’s little one-stall engine house and the fog for a dramatic effect. The crew arrived, opened the engine house and fired up the old “F” and turned on the headlight, and then brakeman Ralph Whitlock moved to the switch in the foreground. With Ralph silhouetted against the white fog and the train’s headlight looming out of the misty background, I knew I had my shot, and I moved over a bit to include the edge of a box car in silhouette to help frame the scene.
The article ran in a mid-1980’s issue of Rail Classics magazine. Even though this was by far the most dramatic photo of the entire project and I specifically referred to this photo in the article, the editor did not use it! But it remains today over 15 years later as one of my most favorite train photos.
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