Pictures, part 3

I did not begin model railroading until I got to college. I began scratch building very early because of the too few attractive models at the local hobby shop but an abundance of material for building from scratch. It was at this time that I bought the first of 4 SLRs. The first was an all manual, 35 mm film camera. It did have the exposure meter in the lens. Several years later I bought my second, 35 mm SLR, this time it was automatic with manual override. In the years of film, I took thousand of slide. The duplication of subjects and locations, led me to begin to discard the least quality. By the 2000,s digital had become more afordable. And I had over 3,000 slides and even more negatives, color and black and white.

My first digital was a cheap point and shoot model. Soon I got my first digital SLR. Shortly afterwards, I needed a scanner. I found a nice scanner with a slide head. I than began to put all my slides and prints on my computer. All new pictures were taken digitally.

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Pictures, part 2

My first real camera came early. It was a plastic Kodak Brownie. I don't have pictures taken by because I was young. Also, I made one drastic mistake, early on. I left the camera in the rear window of the car, on a hot sunny day. The plastic melted and there when one childhood possession, my first camera.

Later, shortly after high school, I did acquire a Polaroid, Swinger. A cheaper, simpler, Polaroid, self developing camera. The pictures were small, not very good resolution, and I lost most of my pictures. It seem, I had this idea that my pictures, like my journal, might record things for future use when such things did not exist. (I forgot about museum collection, etc.) I only saved a few, pictures, around Williamsburg and for my journal.

It, like so many things, got push aside and forgotten. It was not until the end of my second year of college that I got my first SLR. Which became a fixture, on my days off and vacations.

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Pictures, part 1

I personal travel log includes many many pictures. Across the years, they have run the gambit. In the early years of travel with the family of origin, I collected postcards, as my main picture taking. At one point I got a simple film camera which lasted about two months. I eventually got my first SLR and picture taking became photography. Finally, I have had a variety of digital cameras, including the one in my phone. Which leads to the new equivalent of postcard: the emailed/texted selfie.

Postcards were a great way of getting pictures as you traveled. The photography was better than anything I could do. It was amazing the locations and scenes that the cards would cover. They were taken from locations that we could rarely be. Besides, they were relative cheap. You could even get free postcards of the motel/hotel that you stayed the night in. And what better way of making your friends, at home, envious of your trip, than to send a postcard from some exotic location. OK, they were a good, quick, cheaper way of keeping in touch. Remember when they were five cents each or 6 for a quarter. You could mail them for 4 cents when a letter cost 5 cents. (yes, I am telling my age.)

Some Postcard from My Collection

No. 004, Luray Caverns, 1966	No. 005, Luray Caverns, 1966
No. 006, Alamo Plaza, Charlotte, NC, 1966	No. 007, Charlotte, NC, 1966
No. 008, Charlotte, NC, 1966	No. 015, Morehead Planetarium, Durham, NC, 1966
No. 016, Morehead Planetarium, Durham, NC, 1966	No. 009, Golf Ranch Motel, 1966
No. 012, USS North Carolina, 1966	No. 013, USS North Carolina, 1966
No. 021, Pirateland, Myrtle Beach, 1966	No. 022, Pirateland, Myrtle Beach, 1966
No. 023, Pirateland, Myrtle Beach, 1966

Recently, I got my cards from my parents basement and reorganized them. I numbered them and scanned them into a jpg. than I re-boxed them more appropriately.

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New York City

One destination, not laid out is New York. NYC is such a large place and to plan a vacation is more difficult. My first experience with the city was when I took my first New England vacation more than 40 years ago. My sister lived on Roosevelt Island and a visit was in order. I took the train from Providence, Rhode Island. My uncle and aunt lived there so a visit there was good and a good place to take the train into NYC. It wasn't much of a railfan visit but just touring. I took a tour boat around the Island. I made to Wall Street but not lower.

A few years ago. I began to lay out my train chases and thought about watching trains around NYC. I was planning a vacation to see my sister in MN. I thought that it might be fun to take the train to Newark, NJ and fly out of there, preceded by one day of train watching and ended by one day of train watching.

Day one included a run to Harrison station on the N.J.T. I set up in a parking garage, for the elevation as well as not being so noticed. Than I took P.A.T.H. to Jersey City and watched the light rail. I came back to Hoboken and cross the river via P.A.T.H., walked to Penn Station and took the Long Island RR to Jamaica and the JFK sky train to the airport. Back to Newark via the L.I.R.R. with transfer for the N.J.T. On returning from MN, I went to Trenton and north of the Amtrak station in Newark to watch light rail.

In all these, I did not get to Staten Island for the S.I.R.R. That came this last summer. I took the ferry over to lower Manhattan and toured. Before that I crossed the Hudson at Terrytown, where I watched Hudson River trains. In all my expedience in and around Manhattan, I never did much touring of the Island. In looking at my research, there are many sites that would be nice to see. A unique attraction in High Line Park, an old elevated railroad, now abandoned and turned into a urban park. Than there are the typical attractions such as the new Trade Center (back on my first visit I got to go the observation deck of the old World Trade Center). There are many others. I would make a great daytrip.

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