I’ve got a few thousand negatives, both B&W and colour, from the mid 70’s when I got my first SLR while still in school. The negs are all in acetate sheets, which is good, and I keep hoping I’ll eventually be able to digitize them all. Not much chance of that happening any time soon, but I’m always really gratified when I do a few strips of negs.

Taken while stopped at a light, downtown Dauphin, Manitoba, circa 1973. On the right is the Grange Cafe, the after-school hang out where you could get a vanilla coke (with real vanilla) and cop a smoke without anyone seeing you. Shot from the driver’s side of my 63 Ford Galaxy 500.

I’m not at all nostalgic about this time in my life, I couldn’t wait to get out of that town. But I do get a kick out of digging through the photos. The ones I enjoy the most are the ones that propel me back to a specific moment, or ones that capture the look & feel of the day.

I turned 16 in the winter of 1972, and in the spring my dad bought me this car, saying “This is yours. You keep in running, pay for the gas and insurance, and whatever you do, don’t ask me for the keys to my car.” It was a 4 door standard with column shift – about as dorky as you could get. I stuck a huge ball on the end of the shifter, and discovered just how much you could do in the backseat of one of these babies.

This picture of a gas pump is from 1977 I think, on a road trip to California. Filled the tank with 11 US gallons for just under 7 bucks. Yep, that’s 60.9 cents a GALLON for regular gas.

Below, a couple of shots of me spinning tunes in 1974 at CKDM in Dauphin. By then I was a seasoned pro, having started work there 3 years earlier, just before my 15th birthday. This must have been a country music shift, the 45 I’m looking at is House of Love, a remake by Dottie West.

-30-