The Dry-Plate Pioneers

Submitted into Contest #144 in response to: Start your story with somebody taking a photo.... view prompt

12 comments

Historical Fiction Romance

It was four o’clock in the morning when the hideous chorus erupted next to my head. My Westclox shrieked at me like a merciless automaton from hell sent to torment our wretched cadavers. I heard Carol’s muffled adenoidal protest and felt her playful elbow shove my ribs. ‘It’s your turn to get up, Ted,’ she said, pulling the blankets over her head to block out the awful din. 

I struggled to part my eyelids in the murk and extended my numb fingers towards the infernal clock. Fumbling in vain to stop the persistent racket, I sent it tumbling onto the rough floorboards. The impact jolted the alarm mechanism into silence, and the clock scuttled under the mattress to join our bedpan. I sighed with relief, exhaling a cloud of white vapor that condensed into miniscule droplets on my shoulder.

#

This was the fourth morning in a row we’d dragged our aching limbs through self-inflicted purgatory in the name of my passion for photography. We’d travelled seventy miles by train from Sacramento to Modesto and a further eighty miles on horseback to get to the Pioneer Village. I’d rented the cabin for two weeks and wanted to maximise our time here. I’d scouted potential locations on my previous trip and intended to capture the sunrise on the high ridge-line before leaving. So far, the atmospheric conditions had thwarted us. The last three mornings, I’d saddled up our horses and the sumpter mules and headed off on the valley’s rocky trail. I calculated for thirty minutes to load up the animals with my photo equipment and an hour to reach our vantage point. Setting up the gear was second nature to me. I’d my methods for ensuring the camera was steady and level and had a supply of pre-loaded dry-plates to hand should I require extra shots. In my experience, the set-up wouldn’t take too long and so I’d be ready for the first rays of light by half-past six.

#

I hauled my weary legs out of bed and, huddling under a woollen blanket, raised the cover of our storm lamp. I struck a match and offered the hissing phosphorous flame to the charred wick. The shrivelled cord spluttered to life and emitted a sooty plume of smoke. Once I nudged down the protective glass bulb, the lamp’s cheery orange flame illuminated the shack’s interior like a newborn star at the centre of a homespun solar system.

Behind the pot-bellied-stove’s front grill, I could see precious glowing embers; the remains of last night’s fire. I scrabbled about, adding a handful of kindling and a couple of quarter-cut logs to resurrect the flames. With gentle encouragement, the dry fuel caught fire, and I set our pot of cold water on the top plate. I’d look forward to that steaming brew once I’d fed the animals and rubbed them down. They had a morning’s work to do and so did I. Coffee and toasted rye bread would help me recover my wits and set me up for another day of photography in the wilderness.

#

Decades before the convenience of film cameras, my father experimented with dry-plate photography using glass painted with photo sensitive liquid. He housed individual plates in light-proof wooden boxes before inserting them into the rear of the camera’s body. In historical terms, it was the first time one could capture images and store them in a latent state before processing them. His equipment with its cable release lenses and cloth bellows would be unrecognisable to future generations. Nothing was automated, and he had to devise ways of calculating focal distances and exposure times. Once he’d caught his image, he processed the transparent glass plates using home made developing and fixing chemicals. He called his system “painting with light” and to a lad of my tender years, he was a magician. 

We had a spare room in the basement and he converted it to a darkroom. A dull reddish bulb illuminated it and, according to my mother, his darkroom was a satanic laboratory; a place of devil worship and sorcery. 

She said no good would come from his Mephistophelian chamber and when he demonstrated his grainy images appearing in sulphurous liquids, she left the room in a fluster. It was wicked trickery and became my life’s infatuation. 

My father encouraged me to create my own images and introduced me to the delights of pin-hole photography. He explained the ‘camera obscura’ was a renaissance artist’s tool designed to aid perspective drawing. I understood the principle, and made my own ‘cameras’ from old shoe-boxes, painted photo emulsion onto thick cards and inserted them one at a time into my homemade picture maker. I too would be a master of light and aspired to a life of making pictures.

#

When Carol met me, I was a military serviceman photographing soldiers prior to their voyage across the Atlantic to help the war effort in France. Most times, this was the last portrait the families would receive; plenty didn’t return or received disfiguring wounds in Europe. The portraits also identified the bodies of lost compatriots, if they were lucky enough not to be abandoned on the battlefield.

#

By 1917, the British had been fighting over a hundred yards of wasteland for three years, making no progress. The body count had risen beyond all measure, and both sides now longed for an end to hostilities. Armistice wasn’t too far off, but now there was the additional threat. Spanish flu was about to destroy lives and businesses around the world. My portrait work trailed off as governments enforced isolation policies on the public and I had to consider other alternative means of income.

#

‘But what would persuade people to part with their hard earned money?’ I’d asked Carol, stuffing my hands in my pockets. 

‘Art, of course,’ she’d said, as though it was obvious. ‘The pictures only you could take.’ 

Carol encouraged me to start a novelty picture business and acted as my agent and muse. She had visions of owning a gallery. We’d sell my pictures and curate and sell the works of contemporary artists. ‘Artists can’t sell pictures,’ she’d say, sighing. ‘There’s no point in taking great photographs if you can’t sell them.’

She was right, of course. We’d seen many a “fly-by-night” flogging tatty shots and plenty of talented creatives begging next to a pile of unrecognised masterpieces.

Carol’s suggestion inspired me to head off into the Sierra’s in search of glacial valleys riven by cascading waters, silent forests of lofty redwoods giving shade to sacred lakes and the promise of precipitous cliffs, topped by vertiginous peaks sprinkled with the crystallised remains of a hard winter.

#

‘They say it’s all in the timing, right?’

‘Sure,’ I said, checking my exposure guide as the first rays of deep orange stroked the distant ridges. ‘There’s not much to it.’

‘Anyone can click a button,’ she said, laughing.

‘Just one thing to remember,’ I said, removing the dust cap. ‘Right place and right time.’

Well, that’s certainly true about landscape photography. This wasn’t the first morning we’d got up early to take the perfect picture. The previous three mornings had been a waste of time. The rising mist and low cloud had conspired to muddy up the foreground and obscure the peaks, leaving me with a disappointing low contrast image and uninspiring views. 

Finally, we’d encountered a bright sunrise with roving clouds casting drifting shadows on the pastures and towering escarpment.

‘You’re ready for this, Ted?’

I’d fixed my sturdy tripod in position on a rocky outcrop with the optimum vantage point. It was still near zero and we waited, shivering, for a shaft of sunlight to flow over the distant trees. A horse grazing in the frosty pasture stood facing away from us and resembled a gnarled tree stump at that distance. I made five exposures as the uppermost mountain ridge caught the beautiful clear light, but the distant beast refused to walk on. The final shaft of light approached across the wide meadows. I primed my camera for one last shot. At the last moment, the horse turned and presented a clear silhouette.

‘A solitary animal in an endless plane, below mountains of granite.’

‘That’s a bit of luck.’ I said. ‘Perfect timing.’ 

‘You make it look so easy.’


The End

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May 07, 2022 03:47

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12 comments

Michał Przywara
21:28 May 07, 2022

A nice story. I appreciate the little details at the beginning, like the bedpan, which gradually introduce us to the historical setting without explicitly stating "when". I'm not big into photography, so the details of the craft -- at least, during the story's timeline -- are interesting. Comparing the narrator's approach with his father's was a good idea, as it makes the explanations a direct part of the story. They're not historical facts, they are the reflections of a character. I like the line "sprinkled with the crystallised remains o...

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Howard Halsall
05:26 May 08, 2022

Hello Michal, Thank you for reading my story and leaving your thoughtful feedback. I agree with your comments concerning the ephemeral nature of modern photography. You’re right when you suggest that it’s become a disposable art form. It’s so ubiquitous that it’s now taken for granted and has become valueless. In many respects, photography is a product of modern thinking and has grown up in a consumer society where everything is disposable and our economy relies on built-in obsolescence for its very survival. To illustrate this idea, I reca...

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Craig Westmore
01:12 May 12, 2022

I love the historical detail, Howard. It reminded me of Ansel Adams and his photography. And setting the story in the Sierras made me homesick, but in a good way. I'd love to read more.

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Howard Halsall
01:51 May 12, 2022

Hello Craig, I’m pleased you enjoyed my latest submission; I had a lot of fun writing it. Yep, it’s certainly a magnificent location and it has strong connections for many generations of my American relatives who’ve enjoyed vacations in their cabin for nearly one hundred years. I’m due another visit and can’t wait to return. Take care HH

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Rochelle Miller
23:52 May 10, 2022

Great story! I enjoyed the historical references and appreciate how you feature the true effort and art form of photography. My uncle was an accomplished photographer my whole life, and I always wondered what his days were like in his profession. When Carol mentions that there's no point in taking photos unless you can sell them, It made me wonder about what my uncle sold, and if it was ever beautiful landscapes or just photos of people, and how unfortunate it is that we as humans are more interested in capturing photos to stare at our own...

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Howard Halsall
08:05 May 11, 2022

Hello Rochelle, Thank you for reading my story and sharing your thoughts. I agree with your comments about the use of photography and how the camera has become the go-to-tool of the narcissist. It’s so sad that the camera’s ability to portray the beauty that surrounds us, if we care to find it, has been turned in the opposite direction; pointing inwards instead of outwards. Maybe it’s because the choice to look outwards and make the effort to discover new perspectives takes so much more effort? As they say, ‘you only get of life what you put...

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Alex Sultan
22:00 May 10, 2022

Hi Howard, I hope you are well - sorry for the late comment! I enjoyed reading through your story. I really liked all the details on photography, camera obscura, and shoe-box cameras. It shows you've done your research, and know what you're talking about it. I thought it was cool. The time period was unique as well - I like historical ficitions like this. On a side note, I think I've called my alarm clock 'infernal' as well. It is a good way to describe it. For feedback, and I mean for this is to be taken as constructive, I think some of t...

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Howard Halsall
22:22 May 10, 2022

Hey Alex, Yeah, I’m keeping in good shape thanks and I trust all is well in your neck of the woods. I appreciate the feedback and your useful remark about the paragraph length. It’s one of those stories that I’d love to return to and revise. I have family and distant relatives who have been renting a cabin in the Sierra’s since that time, in the 1920s, so I have no shortage of historical details for something a bit more expansive, so who knows….? Take care HH

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Sharon Hancock
01:17 May 10, 2022

Very interesting story. I enjoyed the beginning and related a lot to the blasting alarm clock. Sounds like a great adventure to go with your spouse in search of the perfect photo. 😻

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Howard Halsall
01:26 May 10, 2022

Hello Sharon, Thanks for reading my story and sharing your thoughts. I’ve got to say it sounds like a holiday from hell, however it’s certainly a big adventure despite the frost bitten extremities. I’ve had a few early starts in my time, but oddly enough I could never get my spouse to join me. Clearly she didn’t know what she was missing… :) Take care HH

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01:34 May 08, 2022

Well done! You’re a gifted writer.

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Howard Halsall
04:36 May 08, 2022

Hello Clinton, Thank you for reading my story and giving your positive feedback; it’s much appreciated. Take care HH

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