Poof! She's Gone, Part 2

In the year 1960, a US Geological Survey team decided to use the 401 Auction House as a good spot to install what is called a Vertical Control Marker or Benchmark. It is said that these markers are normally within .001 of an inch accurate. As you can see in the close up view below, the lot on which the auction house sat is 408 feet above sea level.

The geological data base of both vertical and horizontal markers goes back to 1925 with 736,425 current entries. Some think there might be as many as a million more out there that have been lost track of.  Currently, there is a concerted effort on the part of several hundred volunteers to track down and photograph as many of these markers as possible. So far I have been unable to locate this one in the data base so I might be making a contribution of my own.  For more information on Benchmarks and the US Geological Survey start here:


http://www.peakbagging.com/Benchmark.htm

http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=32744

http://www.geocaching.com/mark/




The Benchmark as seen from the front of the lot. It's the small disk in the foreground and just to the right of center.




A monument to someone's work in 1960.

 

Poof. She's Gone.

This tale has 3 acts.

Act 1  November 2010  Was on the way back from a drive to Youngsville, North Carolina when, as I often do, I decided to pull over and take a few shots of an interesting old building. I knew little about it other than the fact that it had been used as a Friday night auction house for many years. I did not expect to capture much in the way of good photography as it was in the early afternoon on a bright sunny day when the shadows are long and contrast is overbearing. And besides, I had someone waiting in the car who had already let me know they would prefer to be making their way home to lunch. So I did not expect much, other than a few snap shots that might give me some ideas for a good photo project later on. And though they did indeed serve as proof of a worthy project "someday," snapshots are exactly what I got for my 5 minute investment.

Act 2 March 29,2010-Spent the afternoon perusing a fascinating book called OurVanishing Americana: A North Carolina Portrait.  Over a period of about 3 years, author Mike Lassiter visited virtually every town in North Carolina to research and photograph as many old timey soda fountains, general stores, and esso gas stations that were still standing, making almost all of his trips by car on weekends. Naturally he could only do 2 or 3 examples from each town. He closed the book with an appeal for others whom his project had touched to join him in the quest to get even more of our heritage documented. I immediately thought of the auction house near Youngsville and my need to get back to it for some quality photos.

Act 3 May 2 2011  Had an appointment near Youngsville, so I thought this would at last be that opportunity I had been looking for to do the Auction House Shoot.  Wrong. You've heard the saying, "A day late and a dollar short", I'm sure.  What I actually got to photograph was a salvage crew cleaning up what was left of the place, after the demolition squad got through. Another piece of Americana gone, gone, gone.

http://www.amazon.com/Our-Vanishing-Americana-Carolina-Portrait/dp/097046519X

The Old Ships Are Gone But Sometimes We Still Must Sail By Ashbreeze

"Alright mates, we're becalmed. Time to man the boats and take the ash."  Other than "abandon ship", these were possibly the closest words to a Nightmare On Elm Street that a sailor on the old wooden ships of yesteryear could hear. Why? Well, humor me a moment and imagine yourself faced with the dreadful task of having to help a few other unfortunate souls push a Toyota Tundra from Miami to Richmond  by hand...with your life depending on whether you keep that truck moving.

Since sailing ships were totally dependent upon the wind, any extended period of dead calm meant serious trouble. Bad things happen when a ship sits adrift at sea; real bad things.  The only known remedy was for the ship to be towed along it's course by sheer muscle power until the winds returned.  Sometimes it was a day or 2. But on other occasions it turned into weeks.  A heavy rope was fastened between the mother ship and a jon boat full of men who would row in 8-12 hour shifts. The oars were typically made of White Ash for strength and durability. Since the men were said to be making their own breeze, this desperate measure naturally came to be called "sailing by ashbreeze."

Language by nature is always on the move so, not surprisingly, "sailing by ashbreeze"  was eventually picked up by the general population as a metaphor for finding a way to keep going even when there just seemed to be no way.  And again not surprisingly, with 175 years or so separating us from the era of the wooden ships, the colorful words they gave rise to have all but faded from our collective memory.  A few echoes such as "dead in the water", had the wind knocked out of my sails," and so forth remain in fairly common usage. But to borrow from a popular T.V. commercial, life still comes at us hard. And when it comes we have to break out our own ash, though we might choose to call our thorny rose by a different name.

http://wetdog-sailor.blogspot.com/2007/01/sailing-by-ash-breeze.html

https://sites.google.com/site/sailingtheashbreeze/

If Only This Old Porch Could Talk

"The night I announced I was getting married, Daddy paced for hours on the porch."     Loretta Lynn

"Mama used to roll her hair, back before central air.  We'd sit outside and watch the stars at night.  She's tell me to make a wish, I'd wish we could fly.  Don't think she sees the sky since we got the satellite dish."  James McMurty, Loveland

"People in, say Georgia aren't sitting on the porch singing anymore.  They're inside int the air conditioning , watching cable like everybody else." Author unknown

"Okay ya'll I am really super excited about this.  Front porches are one of my most favorite things in the whole world and I finally have mine done.  In January of 2009 we decided that we would do a little add on to our home, a little face-lift you could say." http://andreasattic-andrea.blogspot.com/2010/05/my-total-front-porch-makeover.html

When the weather man gives you a lemon....

Last Saturday I was in Mernard, Texas and really looking forward to shooting an outdoor concert by Will Dupy and Doghouse, a popular area country group. The gig was a key part of the annual Jim Bowie family reunion. Will and the boys were to take the stage at 3:00 Everybody was walking around with crossed fingers as the weather man has not been kind to the celebration recently. Last year's celebration was pretty much a non event as it rained most of the day. Well, either crossing fingers is pointless or somebody let their's slip because about 2:00 everybody, your's truly included got soaked. So not concert!



Well, not quite. One of the sponsors just so happend to have a warehouse less than a half mile away from the park where the Bowie festival was going on. And the band said they came to play and the location didn't make any difference to them.  So they loaded up their equipment and high tailed it over there. And I was right behind them with my camera.


I must tell you, Will and  his guys are no dogs. They had that place rocking. But..... there was another major obstacle. The lighting was terrible and they set up to play in the darkest place of all. I normally prefer available light for concerts but that was totally out of the question. Long story short, my present flash unit is inadequate and as could be expected my shots were nothing special. So I made lemonade.

Paint Mine Red

I believe in punctuality. I also love shooting photos of people getting sweaty and dirty while hard at work. A photographer friend calls them "workaday" images. Combine such scene with a predominant color scheme and you may as well order my casket because I'm about to die and go to heaven. So what happens when I'm putting the pedal to the metal to be some place on time and I happen to pass a crew hard at work, painting a barn roof bright red? I throw on the brakes and grab my camera, of course.

Seeing Through Glass

Shooting through windows or glass store fronts can be challenging. Stray reflections, gross underexposure tendencies, and color shifts must all be dealt with. But there's a huge upside: the interplay of light passing through glass has the potential for producing the feel of mystery and high drama. You just never know what to expect. And with the availability of endless special thanks to digital photo editing programs, the results can be spectacular. I never fail to have a blast shooting in this unique genre.

This little guy wanted out!

                        Splashing on soap suds got his attention!

 Mannequins and glass another great combo.

A polarizing filter would have helped with the reflections here but didn't have one available.