Ken Steinhoff Archives

March 1, 2015November 7, 2016

Battle of the Angels

I’ve been going through a box of old and fading photographs. Most of them are forgettable, but there were two shots that just happened to have been taken in the same general area, and they have in them someone I haven’t seen in the mirror in many years.

The character on the right is me. I think the shadow on the left might be Jim Stone, but there’s also a chance the silhouette might belong to Steve Folsom. Bill Hampton’s name was stamped on the back of the print, so I’m going to guess what happened.

The object dangling from my left hand is the power cord to a Honeywell Strobonar 65D strobe. I probably unhooked the flash, handed the camera to Bill and said, “Why don’t you try shooting a silhouette of us?”

We’re in the hallway leading to the west parking lot. The music department is down the steps, and a ticket booth is the little outcropping on the left. There was also a phone booth down there, on the far side of the ticket booth, I’m pretty sure. (More about the phone booth in a minute.)

Pretending to buy a ticket

I don’t know why I was pretending to buy a ticket from these women. I also don’t know who they are, so I can’t apologize to them for not washing the print long enough to keep fingerprints and brown spots from showing up.

Confession of a no longer young man

I mentioned the phone booth earlier. I debated telling this story because it shows a little bit about how the teenage boy’s mind works, and it’s not always pretty.

I was standing at a discreet distance from the booth waiting for the person inside it to finish a call. When the door opened, a cute girl that I knew only slightly because she had dated a buddy stepped out, visibly distraught.

I asked if something was the matter, and she jumped into my arms and held on like a drowning person clutching a life preserver. I don’t remember the details, but I think she said she had just gotten some bad news about a family member. As I was trying to come up with something comforting to say, I felt some claws grab into my left shoulder and heard my Evil Angel whispering in my ear, “She’s vulnerable. She is REALLY vulnerable. You could take advantage of that.”

Oh, no, here come the Good Angel

Before I could react to that advice, there was a flutter of wings on my Good Angel landed on the other shoulder. “That would be wrong, and you know it,” he whispered in my ear. “Your Mother taught you better than that.”

I extracted myself from the young woman’s grasp, we chatted for a few minutes while she calmed down, she declined my offer of a ride home, and she walked up these steps and down the hallway. I don’t know that I ever talked to her again.

Just as I was congratulating myself for doing The Right Thing, I heard my Good Angel say to the Bad Angel, “You know, you’re right. She looks pretty darned good from this side, too.”

Funny how things like that will pop into your head when you walk the halls of your old high school. (You have to admit the old building has really been well maintained. I think the walls and floors are shinier now than they were in 1965.)

November 14, 2014

Louisville’s Museum Row

Curator Jessica and I were killing time before meeting up with Jon Webb, the Athens Messenger photographer who originated the Picture Page concept before I started working there. She enjoys sewing period costumes, so she was quivering with excitement when she saw the Frazier History Museum had an exhibit Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous: Art, Fashion and Luxury in the Gilded Age.

While we were walking down Museum Row on Main on a cold, windy, drizzly day, I thought it was going to be a long time before anybody swings the bat at the Louisville Slugger Museum.

Better choke up on it

Based on the the size of the man standing next to the 120-foot tall, 68,000-pound steel bat, I’m pretty sure you’d have to choke up on it when you got to the plate.

Looking for the secret password

I watched Jessica when we went to the ticket counter to see if she gave any secret curator handshakes or whispered any passwords to get us a discount, but I had to pay full price to get into the Frazier.

Why the Can-Can was scandalous

Spend enough time in a car with Road Warriorette Jessica and you’ll find out more about period underwear than you ever wanted to know. I’ve gotten pretty adept at the head-nod and “Uh huh, that’s really interesting.”

I DID learn why the Can-Can was so scandalous (but I’m not telling).

Here’s Miz Jessica is counting the whalebone stays that made up this corset. I observed that anything that compressed the waist that much surely must have made the woman’s toes swell. When you squeeze a balloon in one place, it HAS to bulge out somewhere else. (Click on the photos to make them larger.)

Do you think I’m crazy?

Along one was was a bunch of silhouettes that showed the shapes of womens fashion over the years. Miz Jessica backed up to the display and asked me which silhouette most closely resembled her profile.

I’ve been married 45 years. I knew better than to answer THAT question.

I found my gas mask

While she was hustling amidst the bustles, I wandered over to a display that showed a World War II gas mask just like the one I wore when I was teargassed covering student protests at Ohio University. At some point in my Boy Scout career, I carried a canteen that looked like that, too.

I hope it worked better than mine

I hope it worked better in combat than mine did in riots.

Friend and photographer Ed Pieratt shot me in my riot gear. I had to wear my glasses on the outside of the mask because I was blind without them. The old WWII mask kept the gas out, but the lenses fogged up so badly I couldn’t see WITH the mask or WITHOUT it. (By the next riot, I had a state of the art M16 mask courtesy of a policeman who “liberated” one for me. I had it fitted with prescription lenses and used it for another two decades.

I told Curator Jessica that I thought I could lay my hands on the mask, helmet, press card, camera and strobe for an exhibit she’s planning for May. The only thing missing is the jacket and the skinny guy wearing it.

September 12, 2014February 19, 2021

Approaching Antiquity

Curator Jessica and I were on Scenic Route 124 headed for Letart Falls, Ohio, where I wanted to see if an old gas station / convenience store / teenage hangout I had photographed in 1968 was still standing. About 1.9 miles down the road from Racine, and 3.9 miles from Letart Falls, I pulled off onto the shoulder.

“Hop out,” I said to Miz Jessica. “I need some scale in the photograph. Go down that way a bit and start walking back toward the city limits sign, please.”

After I popped off a few frames, she asked what I was REALLY trying to accomplish. Mistrust is an ugly thing in one so young.

“Well, now that you’ve finally hit 30, I thought this would be a photograph of you approaching Antiquity.”

I don’t think ‘guy’ is the word she used

“Wait here, Wiseguy (I’m pretty sure ‘guy’ isn’t the word she used). Go stand under that sign. I may be APPROACHING Antiquity, but you’ve already arrived.”

To add insult to injury, she said she doesn’t like it when I walk behind her because “I can feel old age creeping up on me.”

I’m going to have to start auditioning new Road Warriorettes. I’m just not getting the respect and reverence I deserve.

August 8, 2014April 17, 2021

Picturing the Past Workshop

I had to take my eye off Cape this evening to produce some promotional material for a Picturing the Past workshop I’m doing in Athens, Ohio, at the end of the month. Regular readers have seen most of these pictures, but I’ll be working with a fresh crop of viewers.

The workshop, something dreamed up by Curator Jessica at the Athens County Historical Society and Museum, is going to work with photographers to get them to see how pictures they shoot today may have historical significance in the future.

It’s a challenge for me

I have to admit that I’m a little nervous about this event. I’m used to taking photos, and I’m used to talking about MY photos, and I’ve gotten more comfortable about thinking how my news photos have grown enough whiskers they have become history, but I’m facing a big unknown here. I have no idea how many people are going to sign up (we capped the class at about two dozen), I don’t know what kind of equipment they are going to be using nor how experienced they are going to be.

It’s not a nuts ‘n’ bolts photo class where we’re going to talk about f/stops and shutter speeds, but it will be more about “seeing” a good story-telling photograph. Jessica will explain how the best photograph from an aesthetic standpoint may not be the most useful to a historian trying to ferret out little factoids about a community.

I’m sure you’ll hear more about this as I mull over different approaches during the next week.

Take a giant step backward

I used to tell reporters, amateurs and bureau folks that the best way to take a good photograph was to compose it until it looked perfect in the viewfinder, then take one giant step forward. In this workshop, I’m going to ask folks to take one giant step backward so they can capture the world around the subject in at least a few frames.

“And,” I’m going to say, “if you feel compelled to shoot 500 duck-face selfies, PLEASE turn the camera around at least once.”

Jessica said I had to provide at least minimal biographical information, so here it is. You can click on the photos to make them larger if you want to read the copy.

Thanks to Jessica for convincing the Ohio Humanities Council to give us a grant that will cover part of my travel and lodging expenses, and to the Athens Public Library for providing a space for the programs.