The Picture Man: Photographs By Paul Buchanan Paperback – 1 October 1993

There are plenty of pictures of the people of North Carolina but there are no names associated with them. I bought this for a relative who was born and raised in this area 50 years ago and she was very frustrated. We bought Mitchell County, Images of America and Spruce Pine, Images of America and she knew a lot of people in it and was very pleased.

We had a poster in our basement picked up at a book event when this book was first published. I have always enjoyed looking at the photo of several North Carolina mountain women from the 1920s or 1930s, and wondered who they were. They are real, some pretty, some not so much, and not all are smiling. Some of their dress are rather fancy while others are clearly homemade. Buying this book, I did not find out more about that photo, but many of the rest of the photos are just as compelling. And the photograher's story is even more so. When I think of all the thrown out negatives and photos I have seen the past fifty years in antique stores and flea markets or house sales, I know that without Ann Hawthorne caring interest, this man's work would also have been lost. The story of the broken glass negatives and photos in the garbage of the death of the great photographer Alice Austen on Staten Island is only one of many where without the interest of someone who saw them and paid attention, all would have been lost. I am so glad to have this book alongside "Alice's World: The Life and Photography of an American Original, Alice Austen, 1866-1952" on my shelves, to enjoy again on a winter's night.

Wonderful book and quick shipping!