Thanks for serving

On this Memorial Day, we pay tribute to those who gave their lives in the service of our country.

A few years ago I photographed early morning services at small cemetery in our community. It’s an annual event, followed by a parade. Arriving before the participants, I strolled through the grounds, only about a quarter acre, and read the names on the head stones. Most names were of the early founders of the area.

But one stood out to me, a modest marker that reads “Unknown Soldier, Civil War.” I thought, what an odd place for an unknown soldiers grave. Usually, they would be interred in a National Cemetery. So I decided to ask around.

As it turns out, during the war the body of a Union soldier was washed up on the shore of Lake Erie, literally a stone’s throw away. No one knew where he came from or what unit he belonged to.

Although he didn’t die on some distant battlefield, I thank him for his service in helping unite the nation.

Painted in a circle

When I head to the D.C. area, I’m fortunate to have an excellent place to stay, at a friend’s seasonal home located on the ridge just east of the battlefield of Antietam.

Antietam is my favorite Civil War battlefield and I have visited it many times. I’ve also been to most other major battlefields. By far, in the Eastern Theater, Antietam stands alone as the most pristine park, with little or no commercialism encroaching on its borders. A tip of the hat to the National Park Service and for their effort to return the battlefield to it’s original 1862 condition, including replanting entire groves of woods and orchards.

In juxtaposition is Gettysburg, just 35 miles or so northeast of Antietam (as the crow flies). Over the years the city just kept creeping southward, comprised mostly of tourist traps. But again, thanks to the efforts of the NPS, they have made strides in restoring what they can.

The new visitor’s center, opened in 2008, is a true state-of-the-art museum/theater/educational center. The centerpiece is the restored Cyclorama painting, finished in 1884 by French artist Paul Philippoteaux, depicting “Pickett’s Charge.” Four versions were painted, but only two currently exist, one in private hands. This painting’s original home was Boston, and it was exhibited in its own building. It moved to Gettysburg in 1912 and then to a new location in 1961 (where I first saw it in 1962). The painting measures 42 feet high by 359 long and is intended to be presented in a circle. It underwent restoration from 2005 to 2008 before it moved into its new home.

Visitors stand on a raised platform and watch as a soundtrack describes the scene. Dramatic lighting and sound effects highlight different parts of the image. At the bottom is a diorama that perfectly blends into the painting. It is breathtaking. My only complaint is that visitors don’t get a lot of time to just walk around, in full light, to view the image.

So, if you get the chance to visit, don’t miss it. Also, take in the slide show put together by the Center for Civil War Photography. It’s located near the museum store. A bin below the wide-screen TV contains 3D glasses to put on so you can view how most of the images made during the conflict were intended to be seen.

My son and I spent about two hours in the center, and then made a quick tour of the field. Here is the only pinhole photo I made on my trip. It is a view of the “Slaughter Pen,” looking west from Little Round Top.

(Click on images to view larger versions)

The D.C. dilemma

I had a pleasant, long weekend visiting the Washington, D.C. area, on the occasion to pick up my daughter from college. My son and I went down a few days early to say at a friend’s retreat near Antietam. From there it’s just a 30-minute drive to catch the Metro.

It’s always a dilemma for me when I head into D.C. in trying to decide which camera gear to carry.

Since I knew I was going to be walking quite a bit, I didn’t want to be too encumbered with gear. Although my 35mm DSLR outfit (with wide zoom and tele zoom) fits snugly into a comfortable backpack, it’s still pushing 15 pounds.

My pinhole bag is significantly lighter, if I just take my mini-pod.  No big loss because there are many places you can’t set up a tripod on the street (like in front of the White House). But I had made numerous pinhole photos in the past, the process can be a bit time consuming, and I feared it would cut into our tour time.

So I opted for my Canon G9, in addition to snapshots with my daughter and son and other things that struck my fancy, I had the opportunity to pursue some “reconstructions” at various places. I photographed the Capitol, the Washington Monument, the White House and the Museum of Natural History.

I tried to make some at Fords Theater but there were too many school tours going in and out, milling on the sidewalk, crossing the street in front of me, that it just didn’t work. And I think it really needs to be photographed (notice I didn’t say shot) at dusk for the best effect.

Directly across from the theater is the house where Abraham Lincoln passed from this world (now, he is one for the Ages). Unfortunately it was under renovation and had all sorts of scaffolding and workers in front. Next door, well known to any student of history, is Lincoln’s Waffle Shop, where he and Mary polished off a stack of Belgians before heading across the street for the play.

Is nothing sacred in America?

Seeing the elephant

This week marks the start of the Sesquicentennial of our American Civil War. Prepare to be inundated, over the next four years, with stories, films, news articles and the like. I've always been a student of the Civil War, at least back to my childhood. I'm sure I have read hundreds of books on the topic, and related areas, and have a modest library of my favorite titles and a small collection of vintage photographs.

Halloween, 1962.Oddly, I can pinpoint the moment I got hooked. It was on a family vacation in the summer of 1962. We had stopped at the Manassas visitor’s center. We probably stopped so that my sister and I could stretch our legs, but I think my folks knew I had some interest. My sister and I started walking around and strayed a little bit up a hill. As we came up over the crest we were confronted with a long, solid row of Confederate soldiers advancing up the hill towards us.

As it turns out, it was members of the Virginia National Guard, in full rebel uniform, practicing for the upcoming Centennial reenactment of the second battle of Manassas. I became an official buff then and there.

Flash ahead 15 or so years to where I'm working in Jackson, Mississippi and met another fellow traveler, Bob Zeller, who shared my enthusiasm for the subject. Aside from being regular visitors to Vicksburg, we found the time to "invent" a Civil War board game based on the Battle of Antietam, my friend’s favorite battle. He built the map, I made the markers and together we hashed out the rules. Over the next few years, both of us had moved to different states, so we played the game by mail. Yes, snail mail. We haven’t played in 30 years, but still have it.

I even managed to work in a visit to Charleston, S.C. and the Bentonville battlefield in N.C. on my honeymoon. I implore that if you ever meet my wife, do not bring up the subject.

I learned that both my grandfather and his brother served in 64th N.Y. Vols. My great uncle died of wounds received at the battle of Fredericksburg.

My friend, Bob, went on to found the Center for Civil War Photography, and is a leading expert on Civil War stereo views, the original 3D. Recently, he asked my help, and others, in researching and restoring photos in the Library of Congress to be used in a new documentary for television (it aired this week on the National Geographic channel). It was work, but it was also fun and a learning experience.

But I can't help but temper my enthusiasm of the Civil War’s Sesquicentennial with a little doubt and fear about how the war will be interpreted this time around. There is much opportunity, given its peculiar set of circumstances and events, for the usual over-dramatization, misinformation, shoddy research and commercialization. I hope that’s not what happens. It's important to know where we have come from as a country.
One of my favorite, recent, Civil War images. This is the Battleifield of Antietam, taken early one morning from the deck of my friends place on Red Hill. 

Meriwether and me

I try to keep at least one book going at all times. But I'm a slow reader, mostly confining my time to late night. I get a chapter or two in and I'm done. For the most part, I read non-fiction, history, leaning toward the American Civil War.

But one of the books I've been working on is The Journals of Lewis and Clark, edited by Bernard DeVoto. The other day I came across the passage below. 

When I read it, it made me feel worthless and at the same time, inspired. What he accomplished, at age 30, is unmatched by todays standards (as a sidebar, Meriwether Lewis committed suicide, arguably, at age 35 in a tavern at Grinder's Stand along the Natchez Trace in Mississippi).

From near the Continental Divide. Sunday, August 18th, 1805.

"This day I completed my thirty first year, and conceived that I had in all human probability now existed about half the period which I am to remain in this Sublunary world.
 
I reflected that I had as yet done but little, very little, indeed, to further the happiness of the human race or to advance the information of the succeeding generation.
 
I viewed with regret the many hours I have spent in indolence, and now soarly feel the want of that information which those hours would have given me had they been judiciously expended. but since they are past and cannot be recalled, I dash from me the gloomy thought, and resolved in future, to redouble my exertions and at least indeavour to promote those two primary objects of human existence, by giving them the aid of that portion of talents which nature and fortune have bestowed on me; or in future, to live for mankind, as I have heretofore lived for myself."