Some new photos from Fort Wayne

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Stainless steel classroom sinks and stage lights from the school's theater were among the various items for sale at the pre-demolition sale held at Elmhurst High School on January 27, 2018.

The building is being demolished now.

 

[traveler_101]

I stopped shooting color film in 2011 and switched to digital for my color work. The reason was that I went on a month-long trip to New Mexico that summer and shot 40 rolls of color transparency film, E-6 film. I hadn't shot any color in a while at that point, had been shooting mostly BW, which I could develop myself. I found that there was not one single E-6 lab left anywhere in the state of Indiana (there used to be four of them just in Fort Wayne, a number of others in Indiana's other major cities). I had to send the film to Chicago, and it cost me over $400 to get it developed, and some came back scratched. That was it, no more color film.

The digital camera I bought then was a Canon 5DmkII, a great camera, but it got too heavy for me to carry it and the lenses I had for it as my health got worse. I had suffered a stroke in 2013. So, this year I sold it all and bought the Olympus Pen-F Micro Four Thirds camera and several lenses. I love it, I can carry this gear pain-free all day and the image quality is great.

Now, all this time, I was shooting black and white film, too. I have not shot any BW film in a year though. I just don't feel well enough to stand on my feet in the cold basement where my darkroom is anymore, and my old film scanner is on its last legs. When it dies, I will not have the money to replace it.

I've also become more interested in mastering color photography, something I overlooked when I was younger because I was more into black and white back then. So, I'm all digital, at least for now.

Sorry to hear about your health problems and hope you feel better soon. I have a Pen-F too.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Sorry to hear about your health problems and hope you feel better soon. I have a Pen-F too.

Thanks. Unfortunately, my problems aren't going away. The stroke damaged the right side of my body. I have trouble writing or doing other things with my right hand that require fine motor skills. It didn't kill me, though, and I can still do photography so things are not so bad.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

This is railroad crossing on Sandpoint Road in Fort Wayne, Indiana. It is near my house in the neighborhood where I grew up. Elmhurst Church Of The Nazarene can be seen in the distance.

I photographed it at sunrise, when a blanket of fog hovering right over the ground was beginning to break up.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

This old broken "Arrow Sign" was sitting on top of an old railroad car sitting along State Road 3 in rural Noble County, Indiana.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Three men sit at the counter late at night at Magic Wand, a locally owned restaurant in the small town of Churubusco, Indiana. The guys at the counter are all regular customers; the one on the left eats there nearly every night!

Magic Wand is famous for the hundreds of clowns that decorate the inside of the restaurant. The owners have a huge collection of art, figurines, collector plates and other clown-related objects. Not the place to go if you have a fear of clowns!

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Sherlock is one of the two resident cats at Hyde Brothers Books in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

He is quite fat (even his tail is thick!) because he spends most of his time lounging and eating. He's not very sociable, and gets annoyed with me for photographing him.

Hyde Brothers is an incredible locally-owned used book store on Wells Street in Fort Wayne. As long as I can remember, they've always had at least one cat in residence.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

This discount tobacco store is located in a little shopping center on Wells Street, just north of Third Street, in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

The Wells Street area is a working class neighborhood, and a lot of people there smoke, so this store is always busy. It took a lot of waiting to get a photograph of it without cars parked in front of the store!

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

This old barn stands behind a farmhouse in my neighborhood, a few blocks away from where I grew up. It is on the corner of Ardmore Avenue and Elmhurst Drive in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

The basketball hoop was there, and had already been there a long time, when I was a young boy.

 

[Larry H-L]

Really lovely use of light on the hoop photo, Chris. Well done.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Jack Moore Custom Upholstery is located on Chicago Road (US-12), between Carls Road and County Farm Road, just east of the small town of Sturgis, Michigan.

The building is built of natural, uncut stones and a large American flag covers the front window. The wooden bench in front of the store has an advertisement for another business, Bowersox Floor Center. I saw a number of these benches in Sturgis.

I photographed it in the evening near sunset early last month.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

This mosaic, made of little square glazed ceramic tiles, is built into the outside wall of Elmhurst High School in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

I graduated from Elmhurst in 1994, and the mosaic was added several years later. Fort Wayne Community Schools closed the school in 2010, and demolition of the building began a little over a month ago. It is being slowly taken down using an excavator, so this part of the school hasn't been damaged yet.

I made this photo last week.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Taylor Street Pentecostal Church of God is a small church on Taylor Street, just west of Freeman Street, in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

The sign hanging over the entrance says: "The Full Gospel Believers." This phrase is used by many Pentecostal churches to describe their theology.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

I have photographed this long driveway many times over the years. It leads through the fields to some abandoned barns. There used to be an abandoned farmhouse there, but it was demolished in December, 2017.

This place is on the south side of Lower Huntington Road, just west of Coverdale Road, a couple miles west of Fort Wayne in rural Allen County, Indiana.

This is the first of several photographs that I made here on a very foggy morning last month.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

DeWeese Appliances is an appliance store in the small town of Warren, Indiana.

The company's owner, George DeWeese, is a devout Christian. All of his trucks and advertisements feature the slogan: "Troubled? Try Prayer!"

 

[Timmyjoe]

Love this image Chris.

And I had missed the GE plant images, those are really wonderful. I grew up in Cincinnati and we had a huge GE plant there (don't know if it's still there or not), but it made jet engines. What did the GE plant in Fort Wayne produce?

Best,
-Tim

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Love this image Chris.

And I had missed the GE plant images, those are really wonderful. I grew up in Cincinnati and we had a huge GE plant there (don't know if it's still there or not), but it made jet engines. What did the GE plant in Fort Wayne produce?

Best,
-Tim

There used to be two in Fort Wayne. The one I photographed produced electric motors. The other produced jet engines, like yours did. They sold the aircraft engine plant to BAE Systems several years ago, and it is still in operation.

I got to go back to the GE plant last week and did a bunch of new photos! I haven't got them edited yet, but will soon.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

Here is the second of four photographs that I made at DeWeese Appliances in the small town of Warren, Indiana.

This door frame inside the store was used to mark the growth of owner George DeWeese's grandchildren.

 

[Chriscrawfordphoto]

The third of four photographs that I made at DeWeese Appliances in the small town of Warren, Indiana.

An American flag hangs on the wall above a coin-operated horse kiddie ride. The doorway on the right is the one where the owner's grandchildren recorded their growth, as seen in my previous post.

 

[Spavinaw]

Wow Chris! That really is a genuine American flag on the wall at DeWeese Appliances store. As I noted a few years back the specs for an American flag state that the width is 1.9 times the height. Looks like this flag is in the ballpark. All those 3X5 foot flags you see for sale are 8.4 inches too short and not genuine American flags. It makes a real visual difference.