Matt Steinhoff Archives

December 18, 2014December 19, 2014

Cuban Boatlift Part 1

Road Warriorette Jan and Son Matt nagged at me this morning to dig out some of my Cuban Boatlift photos to go along with the big news that President Obama was going to thaw the Cold War that had been going on since about 1959 or thereabouts.

I protested that I hadn’t even THOUGHT about dipping into my Florida years, but they were persuasive. After about nine boxes, I hit one containing outtakes from the month (minus one day) I spent in Key West watching a flood of people who would change the face of Florida and parts of the United States.

Palm Beach Post May 6

I’ll go into more detail and publish more photos after I’ve had a chance to see what I can find. To be honest, my stomach has been a bit iffy today, and I haven’t felt like spending time in front of the scanner.

We sent a team to Mariel Harbor

We sent photographer George Millener and reporter Edgar Sanchez down to Key West to try to talk their way onto a boat going over to pick up relatives. The word was that it didn’t take long to make the 180-mile round trip. They made a quick call saying they were getting ready to depart and that they’d check in as soon as they got back.

We didn’t hear from that day, nor the next. I was director of photography and was working on a project that was going to take me all over the state, so I decided to use that leeway to check on our team since I needed to go to Key West at some point anyway.

As soon as I hit U.S. 1 south of Miami, I was in a convoy of trailered boats. Every boat that wasn’t on a trailer heading south was parked on the roadside with a For Sale sign on it.

At the Key West city marina, boats were being launched two abreast as quickly as inexperienced mariners could back the trailers up. I saw at least one Cadillac go in up to the windows when the driver backed up too far.

I called the office and said this was a bigger story than the wires were reporting and that I needed a reporter to back me up.

Dick Donovan

They couldn’t have sent a better guy: Dick Donovan was an old-time Chicago cop reporter who had a reputation for getting to the meat of a story. He would stand next to you, then, just before he asked the zinger question that was going to get the subject to react, he’d give you an elbow in the ribs to tell you to get ready.

I’ll go into more detail about the photo at the top left, but I’ll just say that this was the only time I saw Dick with tears in his eyes.

I had to walk away

It didn’t produce as many memorable photos as I would have liked, but it made some memories I’ll never forget.

I was photographing a little boy about the age of Son Matt playing with a little plastic truck just like Matt had at home. Suddenly I realized what a big change was happening in that boy’s life and wondered what the future held for him. I had to walk away for a few minutes.

A little Cuban nun who might have been stacked 4’8″ at best, put her hand on my shoulder and said in broken English, “I’ve been watching you. You don’t just take pictures. You have a big heart.”

That comment meant more to me than any award I ever won.

December 14, 2014

Florida Gas Below $2.50

I was all excited in Cape when gas dropped to $3.03 in September.

I’m not sure what it was when Sons Matt and Adam pulled up at this gas station when we were on vacation in the Southwest in the summer of 1990. It’s probably good I didn’t need to put Dino Supreme in my Dodge Caravan.

This afternoon, Wife Lila and I passed a gas station in Palm Beach County where the gas was less than $2.50. That’s pretty good for us; our taxes usually make it about a dime a gallon higher here than it is in Okeechobee County, northwest of us. (I always buy a lottery ticket when I gas up at a station there. You know how it seems like it’s always some out-of-the-way place in a little town that gets a winner. I keep hoping.)

Gas station stories over the years

November 6, 2014

St. Louis City Museum

Kid Matt, Sarah and Malcolm made a trek to the St. Louis City Museum when they were in MO in the summer of 2013. He had the advantage of having a young kid along who would try anything, as these photos will prove.

Curator Jessica and I got to the joint just before closing on a chilly, rainy afternoon, and she didn’t even want to ride the Ferris wheel on the building’s roof.

She kept muttering something like “You’re standing on a banana peel on the steps to eternity, but I’ve got a lot of life left, and I don’t intend to die on a Ferris wheel in St. Louis.”

Everybody was friendly

When we pulled into the parking lot, the attendant said, “We’re going to close in an hour, so I’m not going to charge you for parking.” That earned him one of Miz Jessica’s super-fine homemade-and-carried-from-Ohio cookies.

The same thing happened at the admission desk. Instead of paying $17 for museum and rooftop access, we were only charged $8. All of the workers we met were friendly and helpful.

I got her on the Ferris wheel

With a lot of pressure and a fair amount of shaming, I got Miz Cautious Curator on the Ferris wheel. In return, she made me hop into the dark hole that was a 10-story spiral slide. I didn’t have time to get claustrophobic, but I did get slightly concerned when the rubber soles of my shoes caused me to hang up on some of the tight turns. I wish I had asked earlier how they flush the tunnel of stopped-up slidees.

City Museum photo gallery

Here is a sample of what we were able to see in about an hour. We didn’t spend any time in the museum proper. Your kids will love this place. Click on any photo to make it larger, then use your arrow keys to mover through the gallery. Go to the City Museum website for more information.

October 24, 2014

My Office Heirlooms

I was talking with a former newspaper colleague tonight – Foodie and Road Warriorette Jan. I was having one of our favorite discussions about food.

“If there is a stick of salami in a Ziploc bag and it feels sort of sticky-slimy when you pick it up, and the exposed end is kind of gray, and the insides have the same kind of gray extending as much as a quarter inch toward the middle, do you think it’s OK to eat if I trim out the heart of it?”

“It probably WON’T kill you”

There was a silence, a long sigh, and a “Well, it probably WON’T kill you, but you could have an unpleasant day tomorrow if you eat it.” Deep down in her heart, I think she really DID want me to eat it.

Anyway, that got me thinking about my old office. It’s hard to believe I’ve been retired since about this time in 2008. Before I packed everything up, I shot some pictures to remind me of what it looked like.

The “In Case of Emergency Break Glass fire alarm” (with broken glass) came from a yard sale. The “Matt and Sarah got married and all I got was this lousy cup” came from their wedding. “I Don’t Do Perky” came from Nancy Allen, one of my help desk people. I’m not sure why she thought it was an appropriate gift for me.

A lump of coal

The dark object on the left side of Dad’s dragline ashtray is a lump of coal photo lab tech Mary Ann Bates gave me for Christmas. There’s probably some kind of message there, too, but I never could figure it out.

The Potashnick sticker came from a yard sale.

The BS grinder

I’m not sure where I got the wooden object with the crank handle.

Lon Danielson, the general manager came into my office while I was on the phone one afternoon. While he was waiting for me to wrap up the call, he started looking at my heirlooms.

“What’s this?” he asked after I put the phone down, picking up the object and idly turning the crank.

“It’s a BS grinder,” I replied.

I noticed that every time he came into my office after that, he would pick up my BS grinder and start cranking it. There was probably a message there, too.

You’ll recognize the Indian head from a story I did about slot machines and gambling raids.

“You’ve got to show me”

I had little patience with vendors who wasted my time. When a new one came in, I’d point to my bulletin board to set the ground rules.

Click on the photos to make them larger. By the way, you can see more shots of my office and hidden areas that only techie types could get into if you follow the tour of the Hula Parrot.