Personal thoughts for today by Joe Farace
“Things ain’t what they used to be and probably never was.”—Will Rogers
On August 24, we honor the seventh state to join the Union with National Maryland Day. Maryland’s coastal location brings with it a deeply rooted maritime tradition that includes an ocean battle during the War of 1812 that featured the defense of the city of Baltimore at Fort McHenry Francis Scott Key was a witness to the action and was so inspired, that he wrote the words of what would would later became our National Anthem.
Much later in the city’s history, Johns Hopkins became a successful businessman and philanthropist. Hopkins’ forward-thinking provided for the development of Johns Hopkins University that I attended, Johns Hopkins Hospital and Johns Hopkins School of Medicine among others.
The Photograph
I made the above photograph of my former home in Baltimore in the 200-year old community of Dickeyville—I always think of it as Brigadoon—on January 1, 1976. Shortly before that, I purchased my first Hasselblad, a brand-new chrome-trimmed 500CM with black Zeiss 80mm lens. Just to make everyone feel bad, I paid $667 for the whole package, that included an A12 film back. At that time, all of my photographer friends thought that I was crazy, “You paid that much for a camera,” they repeatedly told me. Today a 500CM in excellent condition is worth $1500-2000, maybe more, while a 100-megapixel Hasselblad X2D 100C costs $8,999.
The above image was shot with that selfsame Hasselblad 500CM and 80mm f2.8 T* lens using Ektachrome 120 film, exposure was unrecorded.The camera was sitting on a knockoff of the classic Tiltall tripod that later fell apart; I have a real one now. The film was digitized during a time when Kodak offered it’s wonderful (I still miss it) Photo CD scanning service.
Nostalgia
When I made this photograph of my home, I was working as an engineer for a Great Metropolitan Telephone company and trying to make my way in the world as a professional photographer at nights and weekends. Just a few years years after I made that photograph, my life drastically changed. The photograph of the house in Maryland where I was living at the time is one that I call “a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away…” because my life has changed so much since that time.
Somewhere along the line when Mary and I sold our studio, we also sold all of our Hasselblad film cameras. (Yes, it was a dumb idea.) Years later when nostalgia overcame me I purchased two Hasselblads, a 503CW body as well as a Flexbody, but I was never able to afford to buy either a lens or film back for either of these cameras, so I reluctantly sold them. Or as Chuck Berry once sang, c’est la vie, say the old folks, it goes to show you never can tell.
The definitive book on the Hasselblad film camera system is Freytag’s The Hasselblad Way, which is available used on Amazon for around $29. I;m sure there are copies on eBay as well. Also any book by Ernst Wildi is highly recommended for people interested in Hasselblad cameras.
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