The staff at that time consisted of Chief Photographer Norm Bergsma and Photographers Bob White and Terry Thomas.
Terry Thomas has left a comment or two on this blog over the years, since he worked with Journal cartoonist Gene Patrick, the subject of many blog posts. Thus I felt comfortable reaching out to Terry recently at his photography studio in Atlanta, Georgia to see what he remembered about this ad.
Terry graciously responded with the behind-the-scenes story.
“Boy oh boy, does that Journal advertisement bring back
memories,” he wrote. "I used to have a copy of that page taped to my darkroom door
which was in the basement of my parents home on Idaho Avenue.
“I don't remember whose idea it was to do this, but the three
of us wanted to show off our collection of photography equipment
in which we had invested. The only cameras that the Journal owned were a couple
Yashica 120 twin lens reflexes that had some Honeywell strobes attached; the reporters used those."
Terry explained the paper’s “rules” regarding the photographic equipment.
“The Journal's position was that we *could* use the Yashica
roll film cameras for our work,” he noted. "If, however, we wanted to use our own
gear, such as 35mm Nikons, we were on our own. But if anything happened, the repairs or replacements came out of our pockets. We didn't
want to use the roll film cameras because they didn't have a variety of
lenses, motor drives or work fast.”
The Journal’s position about the cameras, etc. apparently was unique among newspapers.
As Terry noted, “Other newspapers, such as the
Akron Beacon-Journal, owned and supplied all of the photography
equipment that their photographers used. All of the awards that we won
were created with our own equipment.”
But getting back to the story of the ad.
“So one sunny day, Norm Bergsma, Bob White and I hauled our
gear up to the roof of the Lorain Journal building and posed for the photo,” reminisced Terry. "I
am fairly certain that the late Gene Patrick created it. Gene was a very talented photographer, as well as an artist.
“Norm passed away a couple years ago down in the Arizona or
New Mexico area. I once found his obituary on the web.
"I have no idea about
Bob's whereabouts these days. He married Kathy, one of the Journal's lovely reporters
and the last I heard years ago, they were living in Sheffield Lake.”
So what is Terry doing these days? He’s still working and doing what he loves.
"These days, at age 73, I am still a working professional
photographer," noted Terry. "I photograph food for restaurant advertising. I also work on
the sets of films and television shows as the Director of Photography
or Unit Stills Photographer, creating publicity photographs which are
used to advertise and publicize the productions. From time to time,
I can also be found in front of the camera as an actor. You can spot me
in many scenes of Stranger Things - Season One.”
Special thanks to Terry for sharing some of his Journal memories! You can visit his Facebook page here.
****
By the way, I noticed earlier this year that Global Plastics Technologies, the company leasing the former Morning Journal building, erected a new sign on the clock tower.
2 comments:
Too bad they didn't fix the stupid clock and temp readout at the top of the tower.
As I recall, all three clocks were often wrong.
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