I began making photographs about 1942, and in those days that meant black and white film and developing and printing in the dark-room. I thought photography made a harmless hobby, but was not the serious kind of work that I thought my parents or the world at large with all of its beautiful women expected of me. And so I attempted serious things and photographed as I bugled along.

Today, I find myself on the downhill side of life and wonder sentimentally what that hill was all about and did I do it justice. As I look at my photos now, I think that perhaps they are the serious work of my life and the roadmap of whatever that damn hill was. What you will find here are my photo archives, phlogs where words and photos come together, Nikki Beinstein Strait’s chapters giving her view of the situation, and odds and ends too fierce to mention.

It is still a pilgrimage, but now in thought, language and image; “A savage journey to the heart of the American predicament.”

Won’t you come into the garden?
I would like my roses to see you.
- Richard B. Sheridan