Category Archives: News Assignments

by Al Golub

Senator Sam Ervin (D- North Carolina) 1975

Famous Faces is a new gallery I just started on PhotoShelter.  I needed a place to organize the images of famous and infamous people I have photographed during my career: George McGovern, George Wallace, OJ Simpson, Joe Louis, and Ronald Reagan to mention a few.

In 1975, recently retired US Senator Sam Ervin was on a speaking tour.  Sponsored by The Modesto Bee and Modesto Junior College, he spoke in the MJC auditorium Wednesday night, November 19, 1975.  I wanted to photograph Senator Ervin because he was a major player in the Watergate hearings.  While I was in high school, my parents referred to Ervin as a Dixiecrat, I guess because he was a Democrat who defended the Jim Crow laws and racial segregation.  I was taught that everybody was equal and watched my parents live that example.  So my plan was to focus on the Senator’s investigation of the Watergate scandal that led to the resignation of Richard Nixon.

Wednesday afternoon, a press conference was held for Senator Sam in the MJC student lounge.  I got the assignment, but the editor told me on the way out the door that the main picture was going to be of him speaking that night.  I guess it didn’t occur to them how much closer I could get to the subject at the press conference and what an outstanding opportunity it was to make great images.  I was only three to ten feet away from Ervin, whereas the MJC auditorium kept photographers forty feet away and on a lower plane due to the elevated stage.  Several times, I jumped up onto the stage and photographed right on top of the subject.  This approach has two drawbacks.  First, you irritate the audience and second, you need a good helping of intestinal fortitude even to have the courage to risk it.  Oh yea, in 1975 I could jump onto the stage.

At 79 years old, Sam Ervin was loaded with charm and wit.  Using my trusty 105mm, I photographed him right, left and center.  The three-light setup by the TV guys working together made for classic lighting.  It is common for TV and still photographers to discuss lighting before a press conference.

With his country lawyer Southern drawl, Ervin delivered lines like “Unfortunately in this tragedy, the President failed to perform his constitutional duties to take care that the laws be faithfully executed.  But the wisdom of the division of powers in government, made manifest by the Congress and the courts remaining faithful to their constitutional trust, enabled our country to weather one of the greatest storms any nation could have had.”

The Senator listened carefully to a reporter’s question about freedom of the press and answered, “It’s absolutely essential.  The men who wrote our Constitution put that guarantee in the First Amendment because they knew the full, free flow of information is essential to make government effective and to prevent tyranny over people’s minds.  It’s not to benefit the press, but to give Americans the information they need.”

Senator Sam Ervin impressed me.  He looked directly into to my eyes, acknowledging I was a real person not merely a fixture in the room, which many politicians appear to think.  To photograph him, I used a Nikon F2 with 105mm f 2.5 lens and Kodak Tri-X rated at 400 ISO and processed by hand in Ethol UFG film developer.  I used moderate agitation to control the contrast because of the harsh quartz halogen lights.

 

 

 

by Al Golub

Riot Training 1967

Less than two months after the infamous Detroit riot of July 1967 in which the Michigan National Guard was called out, I was assigned to photograph California National Guard riot training for the Modesto Bee.  At the time, I was still learning how to be a professional photojournalist, dealing with law enforcement and government agencies on a daily basis, listening to their view of events, and keeping the interests of the reading public first and foremost.  Now I would be working with an arm of the military during a turbulent, conflict-filled time.

I had strong feelings about the Detroit riot, which lasted five days with 43 people killed.  I also had strong feelings about the 1965 Watts Riots during which 34 people had been killed and over a thousand injured.  I was in the Air Force at the time.  Because I grew up in the Los Angeles area, the Watts Riots were close to home and I wanted to get down there to check things out.  But that was impossible.

While I was in the Air Force, more than three of my four years were dedicated to the Castle Air Force Base Valley Bomber.  As the Valley Bomber’s photographer, I got tons of experience making visual images to tell stories.  It was easy for me to listen as the story subjects explained their job or department, its functions and operations.  As they talked, visual ideas would instantly pop into my mind about how to tell their story.  The process was uncomplicated, uncontroversial, and simple.

Now that I was in the world of photojournalism, I worked very hard to make the truth my mantra.  Most subjects are controversial to one degree or another.  Objectivity is essential.  Achieving objectivity is an internal struggle that requires understanding my personal feelings while truly remaining open to the reality and facts I see.

The Modesto Bee provided me with some great mentors.  Both Chuck Rodgers and Forrest Jackson instilled in me that we owed it to our readers to be truthful.  They would kid me a lot, saying, “Don’t worry.  Only a couple hundred thousand people will see your work.  If you make a mistake there will be phone calls.”

On my way to the assignment, a load of issues were going through my head.  Most of my family has been in the military, so it was common knowledge in the family that using soldiers as riot control is dangerous.  I didn’t want to glamorize the lethal approach to riot control, but I didn’t want to make the guardsmen look bad in any way.  I knew that they were young men just doing their duty.  At the same time, my military training told me that these infantrymen would be battle-trained and not prepared for civilian riot control.  I concluded that my approach would be to show the training as seriously and accurately as I could.  The images would tell the story and readers could draw their own conclusions.

Lucky for me, I had learned from my dad to be straightforward with everyone.  When I got to the Armory I talked to the 1st sergeant.  He gave me full access to the training (after hitting me up about how I could join the National Guard and make some extra cash).  Out on the field, there were troops with fixed bayonets moving forward on a skirmish line.  Purple smoke grenades were being shot from M14 grenade launchers to simulate tear gas.  So I took off running to the center of the skirmish line.  The troops kept coming and I kept shooting, using my Nikon high-speed thumb motor drive system.  Everything came together in a few moments and then it was over.  I photographed some other images including a practice interaction with a crowd of civilian-dressed guardsmen, but I knew that the skirmish line shot would tell the reader how dangerous it is to use lethally-equipped, battle-trained troops against our own citizens.

Back at the paper, the page one editor decided to use my single shot of PFC David Dean pointing his bayonet at me.  As I shot, PFC Dean stopped and held his bayonet toward me.  I only got a couple of clicks before he lowered his weapon as the Spec4 gave the “at ease” command.  Then, being a good photojournalist, I asked him his name and rank.

In those years the Modesto Bee used “Bee Photo” for most bylines rather than the photographer’s name.  On rare occasions when the editors felt images warranted a personal byline, the photographer’s name was used.  PFC Dean ended up on A-1 and they gave me the personal byline with three more images on A-4.  The next day instead of being happy about the personal byline, I complained about the inaccurate caption, which stated that the soldier was walking through tear gas.  I asked Chuck, “How stupid do they think I am to say I would walk into tear gas to take a picture?”  He calmly told me, as I also learned to do in later years, that he would talk to the caption writer.  Without a pause, he handed me a couple of new assignments.  And like the good photojournalist I was becoming, I immediately took off to do them.

As expected, I caught plenty of flack about being so macho that I would walk through tear gas to get a picture.  The friendly harassment was not unwelcome, but even more important was my satisfaction that I had made an image that told the story.  Reader response was positive.  Some were scared.  And that was just as it should have been.

 

 

by Al Golub

Jess Tharp — Fourth of July, 36 Years Ago

In the middle of June 1975, Laurelei Mullens, Modesto Bee features editor, sent me to south Modesto to photograph Jess Tharp, an 80-year-old cowboy saddle maker.  Mullens was doing an advance story for the big Modesto Independence Day Parade.  She wanted to do the story about Tharp because he would be the oldest rider in the parade and had been making and repairing saddles for over half a century.

When Tharp returned home in 1919 after serving our country in World War I, he changed careers.  Before the war, he had been a full time cowboy.  After the war he was offered $35 and beans for breaking horses, a job that had paid twice as much before the war.  He said, “Forgit it.”  From 1922 on, he would be a saddle maker.  He got his start in a saddletree shop in Utah.

Jess’s saddle shop in Modesto was full of smells that were familiar to me.  I grew up in my father’s shoe repair business.  Golub’s Shoe Repair smelled of freshly tanned leather just like this saddle shop.  There was a heavy coat of dust that came from shaving leather and the tools were similar to those I played with as a kid.  To see Jess’s images on Photoshelter click here.

Jess took cheerful pride in the saddle he was going to use in the 4th of July parade.  He used a saddletree that was older than he was, made in 1882.  He restored the saddle the year before, but this would be the first time he used it since the restoration.

He told me he would be the oldest rider in the parade and would wear his 60-year-old spurs, saying “I’ve rode many broncs with those spurs since 1915.”

Jess gave me a quick lesson in hand tooling.  He let me practice making an acorn pattern on a scrap of leather.

He hand tooled the Main & Winchester trademark on the fender of the saddle. The Main & Winchester Saddlery was one of the best known among the Old West Saddleries.  They were a San Francisco based business that started up during the Gold Rush of 1849.

When asked why he kept on working into his later years he said, “If I’d just sit down and do nothing. I’d be a mess.”

“Sure, I worked as a cowboy for three years steady, getting $70 a month for breaking horses, but that was before the war.”

Jess works a hand-operated cutting machine for making leather strips to be used as reins and other rigging.

Special sewing machine is used to groove and stitch leather reins together.  Being in Jess’s saddle shop was like going back in time.  Jess told me about his days in Colorado when he carried a .32-20 Colt in his chaps pocket.  “It was one of the long barreled jobs.”

On the cantle of the saddle was the original trademark.  Jess’s pride and craftsmanship reminded me of my father and the shoemakers that worked with him.  I know my craftsmanship and sense of pride for my photography comes from what I learned from my father.

 

 

by Al Golub

Acorn Fire with the Stanislaus Hotshots 1987

The Acorn Fire was well on its way to burning out 26 homes near Markleeville when I got a phone call from a forest service dispatcher telling me that the Stanislaus Hotshots had left Mi-Wuk Village on their way to the fire.  It was about 2:00 p.m. on Thursday, July 30, 1987.  By the time I got reporter Michael Winters it was dark as we headed up Highway 4 toward Markleeville.  In addition to the darkness, I didn’t have the correct radio frequency so we headed to fire camp in Minden, Nevada to locate the crew.  After some confusing exchanges with the incident command team, we found out the Stan Shot crew had been doing some freelance burnouts and were coming back in to eat and get an assignment for the next day.

The next morning, we went with the crew into the Toiyabe National Forest.  We were at about 5,800 feet elevation when we got out of the crew buggy.  This is where Sup 20 Greg “Rax” Overacker took over.  Rax took command of a strike team of shot crews and instructed us to climb up a 1700 foot ridge to start cutting fire line.  I got my best image of sawyer Kevin Wallin hiking up the ridge at about 6,500 feet.

It all started with this photograph I took the year before.  Early June 1986, Bob White, the Sonora Bureau reporter for The Bee, and I did a story on the Stanislaus Hotshots getting ready for the fire season.  The Stan Shots were based at Mi-Wuk Village.  In his office, I asked Overacker what was the difference between his crew and a regular crew.  He said it was how much fire line they could cut per hour.  So we headed to a very steep hillside near Tuolumne City and they started cutting a firebreak.  I ran uphill on the other side of the road and shot this image with my 300mm lens.  Then I ran up and down the firebreak while the crew was cutting.  I didn’t know that Racks and the crew were impressed that I hustled around to make a good image.  To me this was normal.

After my promotion to Chief Photographer in 1980, I inherited the intern program.  As part of briefing interns I would require them to a make a list of assignment ideas that they might want to make a special project during their internship.  I would always offer the idea of spending time with a wildland fire crew and going with the crew to a fire.  Fast forward to 1987 and Bob White is an assistant metro editor.  Bob talked the Forest Service and Greg Overacker into the great idea of me doing a story on the Stanislaus Hotshots.

Half way up the ridge firefighter Turpin from Coulterville takes a moment out of the smoke and blaze before hiking to the top of the 7,600 foot ridge.

I witnessed the Incident Command System (ICS) first hand.  By the time we reached the location to cut fire line, Rax was supervising the air attack.  One of the Stanislaus Hotshot fire captains was the Division chief and the other was the Strike Team leader.  The squad bosses were running the crew.  Each promotion earned the firefighter an increase in pay and was noted on their time cards.

Sup 20 talked to an air tanker and the next thing I knew we had pink dots all over us.

Firefighters cutting a fire line before the active head of the fire got to their position.

The first night we ate at fire camp in Minden, Nevada, and slept in sleeping bags on the open ground.

Members of the Hotshot crew listen to what Overacker had planned for the next day.

Rax observing fire while he was Air Attack Chief. The ICS is lined out in the Fireline Handbook.  I learned so much from this experience.  Unknowable at the time was the fact that there would be another fire in 1987 during which I would put my newly acquired knowledge to use.

I was surprised that after breathing smoke all day a crewmember would want to smoke a cigar.

Crew picture before we headed out for dinner.

Sacramento Bee photographer Dick Schmidt photographed me at the bottom of the hill before we headed up.  He was surprised to see me and had tons of questions, but I had to go.  Thanks, Dick, for sending me this transparency.

 

 

 

 

 

by Al Golub

John V. Tunney California Senatorial Campaign 1970

Last week I blogged my 1968 experience with national politics and campaign trains in my blog “Robert F. Kennedy 1968.”  A little more than two years later, I got the opportunity to put into action what I had learned when I was given the assignment to cover 1970 U.S. Senatorial candidate John V. Tunney.   The press arrangements required reporter Fred Youmans and me to meet the train twelve miles south of Modesto in Turlock.  We identified ourselves to Tunney’s campaign staff and security and got on board the historic observation car known as the “El Dorado” — built in 1924 by Union Pacific and previously used by President Franklin D Roosevelt.  I quickly got to work photographing candidate Tunney and actor Burt Lancaster.  All too soon, we were in Modesto.  Photoshelter The minute I jumped off the “El Dorado,” I hurried to get close under the observation deck.  Tunney was rousing the crowd with a rip-roaring speech and they were responding with enthusiastic cheers. Tunney’s security guards were out in force because there were demonstrators from opponent Senator George Murphy’s campaign.  For me, the guards were easy to deal with because I followed their rules and checked in with Tunney’s staff on the train.

While on the ground, I used my newly acquired Nikkor 20mm f3.5 lens to get good images from the east side of the train.

Burt Lancaster, 1960 Oscar winner for “Elmer Gantry” and politically-ahead-of-his-time Hollywood star, was easy to photograph in the “El Dorado.”  I also spotted Rafer Johnson in the “El Dorado” but didn’t get to photograph him before I had to go. (for more on Rafer Johnson, see last week’s blog “Robert F. Kennedy 1968.”)

Before I left the “El Dorado,” I got a chance to shoot behind the candidate.  This 105mm shot into the audience shows the face of Stanislaus County in 1970.

Took this basic talking head shot of Tunney talking to Fred Youmans.  You should always shoot lots of portraits and talking head images.  These images or mugs always become more important later.

I jumped up on the step below the observation deck and held on with one hand while photographing the crowd with the other.

The protesters and the supporters seem to be having a little pushing match with their campaign signs.

By the time I got over to the west side of the train, Burt Lancaster was speaking.  According to the briefing, this meant the train was going to pull out of the station soon.

While I was behind Tunney on the observation deck, I used the old hands-over-my-head with the 20mm to make this image.

As planned, Ted Benson picked me up at the train station and gave me a ride south to Turlock to pick up my car.  This image was taken a couple years later of the two of us walking together after a similar campaign event.  Can’t remember who gave us this transparency.  The photographer documented our appearance.  Need I say more?