New England Photography-Yankee Magazine

New England Photography-Yankee Magazine

Congratulations Gay Bumgarner
Yankee Magazine Shutterbug of the week

Gay Bumgarner is featured in Yankee Magazine's online gallery this week after being selected as Shutterbug of the week for June 26, 2010. Gay was nominated posthumously by Linda LaCroix who, more recently, has become familiar with her nature and animal photography. You can see the pictures that were selected by the editor, read some of the back-story, and enjoy the enthusiastic comments by fellow photographers on this link-- Gay on Yankee magazine photo gallery.

To be selected is an honor and particularly as it comes posthumously. It has provided a wonderful opportunity to introduce Gay and connect to a new generation of photographers and viewers. Gay was a fierce critic of her own work and threw out most of what she shot. Nevertheless there are about 60,000 transparencies carefully filed in metal cabinets organized by topic and each slide labeled with a unique alphanumeric ID. An astonishing achievement and level of discipline that has made it possible to follow behind her.

After she died, in lieu of any real plan, I moved her entire photography operation into my home in Vermont. I wanted her business interests to remain as viable as possible and, I loved her pictures. This plan, albeit vague, insured that I could get endless copies of her photos including her signature photo "Quarter horses running in snow". My relevant experience with the business was thin but I had asked questions. I drew a diagram of her office based on what she said was important and we packed her collection up based on that floor plan. Too much of what she explained back then was lost on me and little of what happened next was as tidy as it sounds.

In the nearly 2 years since then many things have happened--- things that you “Shutterbuggers” might understand better than most. I became enthralled with the photographs, then the subjects of them, and finally, I started taking photographs myself. Oh, my, she is indeed having her last laugh. I can now give the common and Latin name to most birds of New England and the Midwest, many flowers, the host plants for the caterpillars, the butterflies, and how to submit pictures to 3 separate stock agencies via my new website. I have waded into a strange and foreign world and her business has survived. The critical secrets to this survival have been my flexible day job, my love of big complex gnarly computer data-base challenges, and my mother’s impeccable record-keeping. I have jettisoned lots of things– some wisely and others less so. My family has been sturdy and good humored about this enormous change and I have been graciously helped by many of her fellow photographers, editors, and even the scary stock agency people.

I am honored when people are interested in her pictures or the subjects and scenes in the pictures. I love telling the stories and I am grateful to Jeff Folger (Foliage) who manages the online elements of Yankee magazine including their facebook site and an active discussion group of both novice and professional photographers from all over New England-- a wonderful community.

You can see the pictures selected for the online Yankee Magazine on our website too.

Next post-- some storytelling about the adventures of the past two years and some good humored backstory for your entertainment.

Poems for Friendship

I found a box of Gay's recently. It was a special box, cardboard with hinges and a bow with  nice paper on the outside. I looked in it and read when was in it trying to figure out its theme?  How did these bits and peices all end up together? It happens like that around my house.... As careful as we tried to be nonetheless much arrived in Vermont



Let me share a few of the contents.  Readers may recognize them or some may not know that your card, picture, or note was in the box too. For some of you I will be mailing you something from the box because I think it speaks to the friendship of so many years and it obviously was something you all shared.          

I found two themes-- Maybe more if I pay attention ----- Do you want to guess?

Variations on the theme of friendship - A. J. Constance

I It was just like old times, as they say except it was better than the old times It was more like the new, new times to come More like what we are and are becoming and will be Than like what we have been and were.	II Whatever I can give you of myself, that you have not already acknowledged as your own What gift is left then to pass between us, but the living out of  that ultimate priceless gift of friendship already given and received and given back again.
III Was ever the wind so gentle on my face? Did sea ever stretch out its arms to such wise horizons? Has the sky ever been so full of peace and promise? Has it been that I have been alive here on this earth through many years, or have i just been born for the first time today, Into this world of inexpressible beauty and tenderness?	IV It occurs to me as I watch the wind move Through these ancient olive trees, that thirty years from now these ties between us will be stronger whatever paths our lives may take and that I shall cherish you then, in that quite different time (so far beyond our present seeing), even more than I do now.

NORTH FORK OF GRINDSTONE CREEK

This is a favorite image of Gay's and a favorite place for her. Here is how she described it in writing for people that liked the picture.

"This picture was taken with late sun shining in autumn on the north fork of Grindstone creek and limestone cliffs. This creek is the type known as a “loosing creek” because when it rains it rises rapidly, sometimes as much as 12 ft, but within a few days loses is extra water into the many tributaries which have also emptied into it. The creek then moves on and joins the south fork of the grindstone, then to the Hinkson and then to parts beyond.


The forest here is native oak, hickory, maple, serviceberry and sycamore plus many others. This section of creek usually has water in it except for a few weeks if no rain falls for many weeks. There are deep holes, such as exists at the base of the cliff you see. During one very dry summer, the hole had water holding fish and frogs and a Green Heron and northern water snake (harmless) tried to share the hole but finally disputed the territory.


Gay Bumgarner, photographer"
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Notes from Sharon-- a little back story for the picture and the place.

There are many photos of this spot. It was essentially her back yard and on special nights she would turn on the lamps hidden in the bluffs and the dramatic rock faces would shine and skitter with shadows.

Gay and Jim placed a bench there to watch things happen. There is a picture of Jim on the bench with Bugsy his companion turkey (or guard turkey). He could hide there with bugsy, have a secret smoke sometimes, rest from the weed eating, supervise my brother rappelling while trimming the trees. There is also a wonderful, romantic photo of Gay and Jim siting on that bench together in the fall (K1300a_Older couple shares a bench.tif) --

The area was changed greatly by the city trying to improve the flow of sewerage in pipes placed under the creek. Gay hounded them for 2 years across her property and made sure they did a good job. She marked every tree, and kept them to their word. The new job they made can be seen in [E0512_Grindstone creek after major city public works.tif] and the bench where they sat returned to its place.

In 2008, during her final summer we spent a lot of time on the deck looking over the lake and beyond to the bluffs. The efforts of maintenance had scaled down with age and Jim's absence-- unnoticeable to any normal human gardener but a source of wry interest to her.

The Canada geese were nesting and presented an excellent low-key distraction and mini-drama. After years of building among the reeds and grasses on the lake shore the geese finally abandoned the strategy. Too many eggs and goslings were lost to Raccoons, turtles, and other predators. Thus, almost 15 after the lake was adopted by Canada geese they began to build their nests on the bluffs- on a flat spot part way up. The view of the nest was perfect from the house but there were tradeoffs and new hazards. Now instead of easing into the water for a first swim the gosling had to “jump” or “fly-fall” down to the creek 15 feet below then a hike up the creek edge over the dam and into the lake. Not a clear improvement overall.

In the summer of 2008 on a perfect day Gay and I were on the deck watching the lake. The male goose came and offered the female her short respite from the nest. The two of them swam together for a brief time every afternoon. They muttered and honked and sounded as if they were catching up on all the events of the world. This quiet pair swimming together -- such a romantic sight and a deserved break.

But, then, they were out of the water up on the dam, upset, honking, running back and forth across the dam. They were yelling and flapping at something happening in the nest. We were puzzled and mesmerized. But, suddenly on the ledge where the eggs sat something pushed one of the eggs off into the creek onto the rocks below. Then we were up, standing, binoculars fixed to the spot, shouting at this unknown malevolent force, no superpowers to help. We watched disbelieving as one after another the remaining 3 eggs were pushed out of the nest, first to the edge where it would teeter and almost rest then it was pushed again. They fell one at a time, lit by the sun, in breathtaking slow motion, orbs alight falling in a perfect arc; disappearing below our view.

My mother gripped her IV pole and the two of us stood on the edge of the deck, holding hands and me offering her a place to lean. We were weeping, outraged and shouting along with the parents whose noise was deafening... all to no effect. Finally, I had to know what it was that would do this, to know if something could survive. It was just days before they would hatch. I took off running across the garden, across the dam, and down the embankment to the base of the bluffs and the creek, to do what?

It was quiet. Whatever did this damage was apparently not interested in the product. I could find nothing. Then down a bit I saw it.... One egg floated in the water midstream, was it intact, was it too cold?

It was cracked but not through and through and it seemed there was some little movement perhaps inside. I carried it to the dam where mother and father were pacing, honking, flapping...beside themselves. Why had they not flown to threaten whatever it was? Were they so certain of the loss or the chance of something worse?

I brought the egg to a soft sunny place in the long grass near them, they were unhappy to see me but overwrought. I backed away. They approached cautiously, sniffed and poked with their beaks, but quickly dismissed it-- dead, too damaged, not theirs, wrong, they wouldn’t own or tend it.

My mother said, leave it, they wont claim it, there is something they know perhaps about the odds and the effort, and there are plenty of others that will want it come dark.

I hated it, that unknown snake or rat that decimated the nest. I wanted signs of the good universe, of the arc of justice and not of waste. If I was facing my mothers death it seemed doubly awful to have the fierceness of the pruning forces be the sign I was to somehow use to help me.
S.McDonnell