Welcome to the Webbpage Blog. Home of Tim Webb Photography. Here is where you can see what really goes on in my life. Enjoy!
High Fiving Joe Lieberman
I thought about this photo of Senator Joe Lieberman when I heard that he passed away yesterday. I took it at EKU during the 2000 presidential election between Al Gore and George W. Bush. Lieberman was a senator from Connecticut and was Gore’s running mate.
The vice presidential debate between he and Dick Chaney was at Centre College in Danville that October. While Chaney chose to fly into Kentucky on the day of the debate, Lieberman chose to stay in Richmond (in a Super 8 on Exit 87 of all places) and prep at the University. He made a public appearance on campus that brought in the secret service and the national media that included CNN, Fox, and other national affiliates.
The one thing I did well at that point in my career was study other photographers on the national level. I was so excited to learn that the White House was sending one of Gore’s photographers, a woman named Callie Shell, whose work I had followed. Our president Bob Kustra and football coach Roy Kidd wanted to meet Lieberman, and I got to shoot that with Callie Shell, while the rest of the media had to stay back in what was known as the press pool. I was plum ga-ga about it, because I got to stand shoulder to shoulder with Callie Shell.
But the secret service failed to tell me that after that shoot with Kustra and Kidd that I had to go back into the press pool with everyone else. Lieberman then went to the grille in the student center to meet some students, when he saw this little boy who was there with his grandparents because they were both on staff at EKU. Lieberman couldn’t pass up the obvious photo-op and gave the kid a high-five.
Here’s where things went south! I thought to myself, “It’s my campus, and I’m the University Photographer, and I can go anywhere I want!” Not!!! I got down on my knees for a low angle and was moving in on the scene, when the folks in the pool started yelling at me to back off. And then it happened. I felt a big hand on my back as two secret service agents dragged me back. But…I got my shot before they got me.
Looking back on this, if that had happened earlier in my career I would’ve been mortified. I probably would’ve just walked out and never came back and spent the next few weeks in the fetal position. But, I shrugged it off, thinking, I would probably never see most of those people again. And, I was right. A few hours later, they all left and I got my campus back.
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The Ansel Adams Mural Project
About two years ago on April 22, 2022, I made a post about my love for Ansel Adams called "RIP Mr. Adams." I was in Washington DC with my family this past December and finally got to visit the Department of Interior Building, where one of Adams' biggest projects is housed. Visting the Department of Interior was also on the bucket list for my son Nolan who works for the Department of Interior and the National Park Service as a park ranger at Mammoth Cave National Park.
In 1941, then-secretary Harold Ickes commissioned Adams to produce a series of murals of the American Southwest to hang in the department's new building. Although, oddly enough, becaue of World War II they cancelled the project and didn't install them, even though Adams had made over 200 photographs for it, including my favorite "Moonrise Over Hernadez, New Mexico." The murals were finally installed in 2009, and it was stunning to finally see these life sized images in person.
As I said in my 2022 post, I have been influenced by so many photographers during my career. And I feel like I've taken or borrowed a little bit here and a little bit there from each of them, but no other photographer has ever had an impact on me as much as Ansel Adams has.
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Old Friends Volume II
It’s funny how some people come and go in your life while other friendships can transcend space and time. One of those friends for me is Brenda Ahearn.
Brenda strolled into my office at EKU one day in October 1996, and wouldn’t take no for an answer until she became one of my student photographers. I had a lot of students work for me over the years but she was the first one to go on and make a career out of it.
Brenda has traveled all over the world and has literally worked and lived all over the United States. Her resume looks like an atlas, ha! She is currently one of the University Photographers at the University of Michigan.
She doesn’t make it back home to Kentucky very often but when she does she always takes time to come see me, which makes this old man feel good. We’ll talk on the phone 3-4 times a year and solve all the world’s problems, and we always call each other on our birthdays, but it was nice seeing her in person today. I’m really proud of her, and really happy that she didn’t settle for “no” 28 years ago. It’s funny how God works that way sometimes.
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Old Friends
In a March 31, 2022 blog post titled Jones 305 #2, I wrote about one of my former student photographer's Kevin Martin. Kevin recently became the Deputy Director of Photography at the Boston Globe. Kevin is a rarity in that he chose the photo editor's path a long time ago and stuck with it. I doubt Boston will be Kevin's last stop in this industry because he's good at what he does. Kevin and his family came back home to Mt. Sterling over the holidays, and we turned it into a reunion of Central Kentucky photographers who worked with Kevin 20 years ago.
Here is my post from March 2022...
I finally learned that the best photographers were the ones who sought me out. The ones that I recruited never seemed to work out. I took it as a God-thing and would just let the Good Lord send people to me. Somewhere around 2001 or 2002, a kid from Mount Sterling emailed me saying he was leaving Western Kentucky University's photojournalism program to come to Eastern, which was unheard of. He said he felt like he was just a number at Western. I told him how myself, along with Mark Cornelison and Rob Carr had come out of Eastern and succeeded when Eastern truly didn't have a photo program to speak of. But, I told him Eastern would give him one thing and that was opportunity.
Opportunity to be a Big Fish in a very small pond. Myself, Corn, and Carr were all examples of what hard work and perseverance could do for you at a place like Eastern. Kevin took my advice, transferred, and worked for me, The Eastern Progress and the Lexington Herald-Leader. Kevin took some criticism for leaving Western, but he proved his critics wrong by going on to get a masters in photojournalism from Ohio University, served on the board of the National Press Photographers Association, and eventually worked at newspapers in Boston, Augusta, Baton Rouge, San Antonio, Knoxville, The Associated Press, and is currently freezing to death as the Visuals Editor at the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, where he was recently named the national visuals editor of the year.
The EKU Group: Chris Radcliffe and Kevin, who both worked for me as university photographers in 2001-2003, myself, and Mark Cornelison.
We had lunch at Joe Bologna's in Lexington. Back row standing, left to right, Mark Cornelison, Amy Wallot, Charles Bertram, myself, Chris Radcliffe. Front row left to right, David Coyle, David Stephenson, David Perry, Kevin and his father Steve. (I was the odd man out by sitting at the David Table with the three Davids).
I Love a Good Cover Shot
I usually get a few national jobs each year, meaning clients outside of Kentucky who need photos inside Kentucky. I did a job back in August for Bucknell University, located in Pennsylvania, on one of their alums, Kevin Fitzgerald, who now lives in Central Kentucky. He blew the whistle on the company he worked for at the time for faulty design of automotive airbags. It ultimately triggered the largest safety recall in automotive history. I photographed him at Jacobson Park in Lexington.
I've said this before, there's something special about making the cover of a magazine. I've always told the editors of Kentucky Living Magazine that if a photographer ever tells you that they don't care about making the cover, then you should fire them, because that means they're either lying to you or they're not passionate enough about their work! I didn't know how Bucknell would treat the photos in their alumni magazine, but turns out I made the cover. That was a nice surprise!
